Howling With Family
by anelson21
Summary: When SHIELD finds a new recruit for the avengers, she accepts the offer. But what will happen when crazy powers, wolves, and the avengers mix? They'll all be in for the ride of their lives.
1. Chapter 1

I DO NOT OWN ANYTHING EXCEPT MY CHARACTERS SARAH LYNN AND LUKE. THIS IS MY DISCLAIMER FOR THE WHOLE STORY. Reviews are appreciated! :)

It was Monday. Not that I cared to know. It was always the same for me. Get up, scrounge for food, then try to find a decent place to sleep. The day of the week certainly didn't matter to me anymore. Not since the accident. Before I go any farther, allow me to introduce myself. I'm Sarah Lynn, and I am NOT normal. I kinda got captured once and then escaped, lucky for me, but I have to live with the consequences of letting myself get captured in the FIRST place. I got injected with something that didn't agree with me. Well, it kinda did. At least whatever I got didn't kill me, but it gave me…. abilities. Like…now I can conjure up ice in my hand, and I can shoot out these little green blasts that are called ecto-blasts. I know what you're thinking, cool right? Wrong. I'm the one who has to deal with them. But anyway, after the accident and stuff, I ran away from…well, nothing. I didn't have anything left. That's when Shield found me. So I was just walking along, minding my own business, when I found I was being followed. If I hadn't trained myself to look for those sort of things, I never would have noticed it. But this was a smallish, early forties looking dude who was pretty good at staying unnoticed. He had on a black suit. Original much? Anyway, I quickly ducked into an ally and twisted through the side streets. Eventually I lost him. I thought I did at least. As I leaned up against the wall of an abandoned building, a hand slipped over my mouth. A surprised yelp tore from my throat, but it mas muffled and I was yanked roughly into the building. I looked around at the people in the room, almost rolling my eyes as I realized they were all wearing black. I lifted up my hand and was ready to freeze some of them, but suddenly everything went black.

I came to slowly, blinking and trying to fight off a tremendous headache. As my vision cleared, I couldn't see anything except darkness. So much for my advanced eyesight. I turned my head a little, then grimaced and squeezed my eyes as my headache intensified and brought a hand up to my head. Or at least I tried to. Dread welled up inside me as I realized that my hands were pulled behind my back and I was sitting stiffly in a chair. Great. I looked around once more, jumping slightly when I realized the same man who followed me in the first place was leaning up against the wall on my left. He was still dressed in black, and this time I couldn't contain the urge to roll my eyes and did so, smirking. The man stepped forward.

"May I ask what's so amusing?" he asked, smiling slightly. That's when I realized he had a kind face, not the kind of expression you would expect to see on someone who just kidnapped you.

I shook my head. "Just every outfit I've seen on you people has been black."

"Yes," he replied. "We kind of have a thing for the color."

I snorted. "So I've noticed."

Silence. Obviously this guy wasn't going to volunteer any information.

"Soooo," I drawled. "Care to tell me who you are?"

"Phil Coulson, from Shield. I have a proposition for you," he replied.

I raised an eyebrow. This should be interesting. When he said nothing, I prompted him. "And that would be….."

"Oh, that's not for me to tell you," he said. I sighed and slumped in the chair.

"Is that why you took me? You have a proposition?" I asked.

He nodded, then suddenly pressed a finger to his ear comm and said, "Yes, sir. Right away."

"You could have just asked to see me, ya know," I sighed.

"Yes, but would you have agreed to come?"

I made a face and finally huffed, "Probably not."

"Exactly," he smirked. "Now, the boss is ready for you, and I have judged you not dangerous. Is that right?"

"Yes," I said sweetly. "Unless you threaten me, of course."

"We're not planning on doing that," he said as the handcuffs on my wrists released. "Unless you try you run."

I rubbed my sore wrists and scowled at him. "I won't."

"Good," he held open the door. "You couldn't go anywhere anyway."

I certainly didn't understand that but didn't question it, and followed him quietly through the endless hallways. I didn't know much about this guy, but something told me he wasn't that bad, and I had learned to trust my instincts. When we finally stopped, we were in front of a door and Phil knocked.

"What?" a voice barked.

"Coulson, sir," Phil said. "I have the target here."

"Get in here, then"

We entered into a room, which I guessed was an office with the desk and computer and papers everywhere. A man greeted us, and it took all my self-control not to burst out laughing at his appearance. He wore a trench coat and an eyepatch, and, again, everything was black.

"Sarah Lynn," he said, and I was instantly creeped out. How did this dude know my name? "Welcome to the helicarrier, I'm director Fury."

Only a few people can instantly command respect from me, and this man was one of them. His voice was deep and commanding, and his good eye was cold and calculating

"Sir," I said respectively, nodding slightly.

"I'm just going to skip the pleasantries and get right to it. As Agent Coulson said, we have a proposition for you."

I waited for him to continue, curious, with eyebrows raised.

"The agency has been keeping an eye on you for a while, and we've even kept some other interested parties off your tail."

"Umm…thanks?" I said, hesitantly. He acknowledged my thanks with a nod.

"I know you had an uncle that worked here-" he said, and I nodded. "And I'm wondering if you know anything about Shield and/or the avengers initiative."

"Well, I know all about both. I…kinda peaked at his files after he died."

"Ah," he said. "I had guessed. And that's good, I don't have to explain the whole organization and processes to you."

I stared at him. What was he driving at?

"We have recently been looking for potential candidates for the avengers initiative, and you immediately caught my eye."

I blinked. Was I REALLY this visible in the world when I was trying to be invisible?

"Sarah Lynn, I would like you to join the avengers initiative."

"Woah," I breathed.

He continued. "You would live in the avengers tower with the others, your schooling would be taken care of when the time comes, you would become a shield agent and occasionally do missions, and I can guarantee that your life would be better than it is now."

I wasn't about to argue with the last statement. It had been a month since the accident, and I was getting tired of having to scrounge for every meal.

"But….I'm only fourteen, surely that's too young," I said.

"We believe you are more than up to the task," Fury said.

"Well…." I hesitated, then made up my mind. This was the only chance of a better life. "Yes."

Fury smiled. "Good."


	2. Chapter 2

Ok, second chapter. Once again, reviews are appreciated! :) -looks to Coulson- You do it this time.

Coulson: -sighs- anelson21 does not own anything here except Sarah Lynn and Luke.

Me: -Appluades-

I was on my way to Stark/avengers by morning. Phil had reassured me that I the team knew I was coming and had prepared accordingly. We rode in a little plane down to New York, the drove to Stark Tower.

"So, what are the avengers like?" I asked. "I mean, I read their files and everything, but…." I trailed off.

"Nervous?" he asked with a smile.

"A little," I admitted sheepishly.

"Well, they're all really nice and a little weird, but I think you can handle them," he laughed slightly.

I smiled.

"Tony and Bruce are science geeks. You guys will get along well."

I blushed a little. I had told him of my love of everything school related, except homework.

"Steve gets along with everyone quite easily," Coulson continued. "Natasha's nice after she warms up to you, and you and Clint both love archery, so you'll be okay. Thor is really never there, but when he is he's nice, just don't steal his poptarts. And then there's Pepper," Coulson smiled fondly. "She's about the nicest person you'll ever meet."

Soon we were engaged in easy conversation, and too soon we pulled up to Stark tower. And even SOONER we were riding up the elevator to the 80th floor. The elevator dinged that absolutely annoying little ding, then the door slid open to reveal a redhead smiling at us.

"Pepper," Coulson smiled.

"Hey Phil," Pepper said, giving him a little hug. "Haven't seen you in a while."

While the two exchanged pleasantries, I let my wary blue eyes roam around the room. My eyes stopped on the couch. Five people were sitting there, most of them looking over our way. Then one of them stood up and came over to me.

"Hi," he smiled warmly and extended his hand. "I'm Steve Rogers."

I shook his hand and smiled back. "Sarah Lynn." My attention was suddenly brought back to Coulson as he said my name.

"And this is Sarah Lynn," he said to Pepper.

"Hi," I smiled.

"Hi, I'm Virginia Potts, but you can call me Pepper." She said. I was probably the same height as her, but in her heels she looked slightly down at me. "The others are over there." She gestured toward the couch. I looked past her to the rest of the people, save Steve, because he had exemplary manners and had already introduced himself and made me feel welcome.

"Well," Coulson announced. "I have to go, I'll leave you all to get acquainted. I scowled at him. Thanks Coulson, way to leave me alone here. He got on the elevator with a smirk and a wink at me. Pepper led me over to stand in front of everyone.

"Guys, this is Sarah Lynn," Pepper said, taking charge. "Why don't you all introduce yourselves."

"Well I'm obviously Tony Stark," a guy said. "No one else could look this awesome and not be me." I noticed his arc reactor glowing faintly under his black shirt, proving to me that he was indeed Tony Stark. They all introduced themselves one by one.

"I'm Natasha Romanoff."

"Clint Barton."

"Bruce Banner, and I apologize in advance for anything Tony does."

I laughed. "Advance apology accepted."

"So what's your powers?" Tony spoke up. "Can you read minds? Can you fly? Can you run really fast?"

Bruce facepalmed.

"No to all of those," I replied to his rapid fire questions.

"Then what can you do?" he asked.

"I can shoot ectoblasts" I said. "And I can also manipulate and conjure up ice."

Steve's eyes widened. "You can control ice?"

I smiled sheepishly. "Still working on the control part."

"Can you show me?" Natasha asked, looking genuinely interested. I made my hand light up with the bright green of my ecto-energy, also making my eyes change to green and glow faintly, then dissipated it and made a small ice crystal in my hand, giving it to Natasha.

"Woah," she breathed.

"It'll never melt." I smiled.

"So," Clint jumped in. "I heard you like archery."

"Uh huh," I nodded.

"Wanna go practice with me?"

My lips quirked into a smile. I hadn't been shown this much attention since the accident. "Got an extra bow?"

"Heck yeah!" he exclaimed. I laughed. Pepper stepped in.

"Why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself?" she suggested tactfully.

I nodded. "Ok, I'm 14, lime green is my favorite color, and a few of my likes are…." I bit my lip, thinking. "Candy, science, ice cream, history, and archery."

"I think I like this kid," Tony tilted his head to the side. "She likes science."

"And I HATE math," I said, smirking.

"Who doesn't?" Someone muttered. I think it was Bruce.

"Ok, guys," Pepper cut in again, laughing slightly. "Calm down. Steve, would you care to show Sarah to her room?"

He stood up. "Sure," he smiled at me.

I found his smile hard to resist and smiled back. Clint jumped up.

"Then you can come down and practice with me."

I nodded, then followed Steve out of the room, the chatter of the others fading as we stepped onto the elevator.

"Your room is on the 92nd floor," he said, pressing the button. "I'm on the same floor as you, as well as Natasha. Clint and Bruce are below us, and Pepper and Tony have the suite on the top floor. The lab is on floor 87, and the gym is on 88, and the obstacle course/ archery range/ lots of other things is on 89. Am I overwhelming you?"

"No," I smiled and shook my head. "You're fine."

"Well then," he continued. "Floor 80, where we just were, is the normal place to meet and hang out. And the kitchen is on 86, and there are lots of other things I'm not going to bore you with."

The elevator door slid opened and I followed Steve down a long hallway until he stopped in front of two doors.

"Here's your room," he pointed to the first door. "My room is right here," he pointed to the second door. So if you need anything, just yell."

"Thanks," I smiled. "I will."

And Steve disappeared into his room. I pushed open the door to mine and gasped. It was HUGE! I examined it, explored it, got the layout of it, and went down to floor 89. Clint was waiting on me, and gave me a quick tour of the place. An archery range, obstacle course, sparring ring, you name it, they had it.

"Wow," I breathed. Clint chuckled at my reaction.

"Wanna know another good thing about Stark tower?" he smirked.

"What?" I asked.

"They have huge, unused vents."

I blinked. Why would I care about that? And what did that have to do anything? Clint smirked again at my expression and explained.

"Well, Tony had these HUGE vents installed and found out they wouldn't be energy efficient, so he replaced them with teeny, tiny, little ones. So the big ones aren't used now."

"Ok, I'm following you," I said slowly. "I think."

Clint grinned and went on. "So these big vents all lead to one big place that was supposed to heat the whole tower, but know it had nothing in it. Its just one big, central hole."

"Yeah…."

"And so-" he stopped. "Well, let me just show you."

He led me over to one of the big vent things. He was right, it was BIG. Like, you had enough room to crawl and even turn around. He crawled into it, and I hesitantly followed him. After a few minutes we emerged into a big room like thing. Only it wasn't empty, it had all kinds of food and bows and arrows stored in it.

"Woah," I breathed. "That's so cool."

Clint walked up and handed a bow to me. "It's an extra," he shrugged. "You can have it."

"Thanks," I smiled. "So what do you do up here?"

He smirked. "Invent pranks."

I raised my eyebrows.

"What?" he asked. "It's fun and entertaining."

I shook my head and laughed.

"So," he asked. "Got any prank ideas?"

I smiled evilly. "Do I?"


	3. Chapter 3

2 Months Later

"Ready?" I whispered to Clint through my ear comm.

"Ready," he confirmed quietly.

"Ok, ready, aim," I aimed my bottle of shaving cream at Tony's head. We were down in the lab. Well, we were in the unused vents. We were both on opposite sides of the room, and I could see him across from me through the metal grating. He glanced up at me and gave me a thumbs up.

"Fire!" I whisper-shouted as two twin streams of fluffy, white shaving cream shot out and landed on Tony's head. Alarmed, his head jerked up toward the vents.

Clint's loud screech of "Retreat!" rang throughout the lab and in my earpiece. I quickly turned around and crawled through the vent. We were both laughing, and I could hear Bruce's laugh ring out behind me. I reached the end of the vent and jumped down swiftly into the hallway, Clint doing the same across from me. We stood there a moment grinning, then he gave me a high five.

"Nice," he laughed. "That was awesome!"

"Thanks," I giggled. "Bruce saw us ya know, just didn't tell."

Suddenly Tony's enraged cry of "Clint! Sarah!" rang out from around the corner.

"Ruuuuunnnnn!" I screamed dramatically, my eyes widening in mock panic. We both took off running, laughing and sliding around corners. I even nearly slammed into Steve, who was by now used to our silliness. I had my bow slung over my back, ever since Clint had given it to me I had never been caught without it. Suddenly I slid around the corner to a long, dead end hallway. Still running, I caught sight of Clint in a vent at ceiling level. I kept running, then jumped onto the opposite wall, planted my foot and pushed off, then clasped Clint's hand. He pulled me in, and I tumbled into him. We lay there, silent besides heavy breathing as Tony grumbled and turned around. As soon as he was gone we erupted into laughter, untangled ourselves and crawled toward the hideout.

"That was hilarious," Clint said, grinning. We reached the hideout. "So," Clint said, rocking back on his heels. "Got any more ideas, genius?"

"Actually," I smirked. "Yeah." I walked over to my stash of arrows and grabbed one, notching it expertly to my bow and aiming it at the far wall.

"Wait!" Clint yelled. "That's an exploding one!"

"I know," I smirked and fired. The arrow DID explode, sending whipped cream everywhere. Everything near the arrow was white and completely covered. Clint's eyes widened.

"That. Was. Awesome!" he grinned.

"I replaced the gunpowder with whipped cream."

"Again, awesome!"

"But we need everyone together to do it. Got any ideas?" I asked.

We threw around ideas, laughing at the stupid ones. Clint had kinda adopted me. Well, they all had. I was just close to Clint. The two people I was probably closest to was Clint and Steve. I had already been assigned to go on a good bit of missions with both of them. Fury wasn't blind to how good of partners we were.

"What if," I mused, brought back to the present dilemma. "What if we set their clocks for really early tomorrow morning, and when they get up and come down to the kitchen like they always do, we fire the arrows onto the table once they're all close enough."

"I like it," Clint's eyes lit up. "What time?"

"4:30," I smirked.

"Perfect," Clint grinned evilly.

"Steve's here," I whispered the next morning. Me and Clint were together this time, but we had comm links in as a precaution. One by one the team arrived. Natasha was the last to slink in, the master assassin instantly catching sight of us. She shook her head, knowing what was coming, and went into the kitchen and leaned against the counter. She seemed to say, "Go ahead."

Tony was in the kitchen making coffee. Everyone else was sitting down. Almost ready. We both had our bows out in front of us, ready to notch our arrows as soon as Tony got close enough. He grabbed his finished coffee and sauntered out. But he didn't come close enough to the table.

"So did EVERYONE'S alarms malfunction last night?" Tony asked.

"Apparently everyone's but the two who probably engineered the thing," Steve raised his eyebrows. Tony finally came over and leaned against the table.

"Go," Clint whispered. We both quickly and expertly notched our arrows, an fired. They both hit the table with a thump. Everyone stared at them.

"3," Clint whispered.

"2," I smirked.

"1," Clint grinned as the arrows exploded and coated everyone with whipped cream.

"Bullseye," I laughed softly. Everyone looked up.

"Retreeeeeeaaaaaattt!" I screamed, and we both turned around and went back to the hideout, laughing uncontrollably. Our comm links crackled to life.

"Barton! Lynn!" Fury barked. "I have a mission for you."

"Yes, sir?" I asked.

"Two assassins, Russians, medium level. More information of the helicarrier. A quin-jet is being sent for you. Be ready." Our comm links died.

"You heard the man!" Clint barked, imitating poorly. "MOVE!"

I rolled my eyes and crawled into one of the vents leading into the hallway where my room was. I dropped down into the hallway and went into my room. I packed light, two outfits, both black. The quin-jet was waiting for us. I sighed. Here we go.

I quietly and quickly slunk around the corner of the building, edging along until I was just out of sight of whomever was in the ally. I knew, of course. It was the assassins that we were supposed to capture. Clint was nowhere in sight, and a wave of worry swept through me. We had gotten separated, and now I had no idea where he was. And that was VERY bad for me. If he didn't get here soon, I'd have to take on those two idiots by myself. My comm had fallen out, I had no idea when. We were in Spain, and if these guys got into the throng of people, there would be no catching them. AND Fury had put a stupid power suppressing bracelet on me, so I was totally defenseless. No gun. No bow, no knife, no powers. Great.

"All we need to do is blend in," I heard the female's voice ring out. "Those agents won't be able to catch us if we get into the crowd. Besides, one was a kid, and the other one looked about the same age as my grandpa."

I scoffed silently and rolled my eyes.

"Ok, ok," the male said. "They probably had back-up though, so let's just hurry up and get out of here. They started walking toward me and I tensed, I would have to fight. At least I had the element of surprise. They neared the entrance to the ally and I jumped, quickly swiping their feet out from under them. The girl jumped up first, but I was already behind her, grabbing her wrists. She struggled violently but I managed to get the cuffs on her and attach her to a pipe. Then the man suddenly grabbed me, slamming me into the wall so hard my head knocked against it and I saw stars. Hehe, yay, another concussion. I quickly reacted, kicking out and catching him in the stomach. He doubled over and I moved toward him. Suddenly he sprang toward me and, being slowed down by the knock on my head, I couldn't react in time to move out of his way. A blinding pain erupted in my side and I stumbled back, grimacing and clutching the wound. He moved toward me again, thinking he had gotten me out of the game. Well, big mistake. As soon as he was close enough, I swiped his feet out from under him, attached the cuffs, grabbed the knife, and subdued him. The only thing to do now was wait for Clint to find me. It didn't take long. I heard a shout, and looked up. Clint rushed over to where I was slumped against the wall.

"Ya okay?" he asked, concern coloring his voice and features.

"Stupid question," I slurred, collapsing into his arms, thoroughly exhausted. Days without sleep had caught up with me. He picked me up gently.

"You're stupid," he mumbled. "You took on those two alone. I didn't even know where you went."

I couldn't think of a good comeback to that one in my exhausted state. So I just mumbled one thing before I drifted off.

"Took ya long enough, Robin Hood."

It took me two days to recover. Well, actually, it took me one. Bruce just wouldn't discharge me. I had the stabbing thingy wound, then I had a concussion, and I was totally exhausted with three days of no sleep. So Bruce kept me two nights in the med bay. Fury took my bracelet off, mumbling some sort of apology. And I was back in the avenger's tower by Thursday. Everything went normal for about a week, then I had a REALLY weird dream. I had had a normal day, went to bed around midnight after being in the lab with Bruce and Tony. Ya know, normal. So I just went to sleep and BAM!, I was in my dream. I was fighting someone, I couldn't see who, but suddenly I turned into a wolf. I didn't mean to in my dream, I just did. I took one look at myself and screamed. Then I woke up, yelping and tumbling off the bed in a tangle of covers. I blinked, feeling weird. The I focused on myself. Why did I have a muzzle? And paws?! I started breathing hard, then got up surprisingly easily and walked into the bathroom, the wolfness already feeling natural. I looked at myself in the floor length mirror. I was a wolf, a HUGE wolf. The one that was in my dream. I was all black except for my paws, which were a silvery white, and a silvery white strip beginning at my nose and widened as it went down my back, and narrowed again as it went up my tail. I also had green eyes with blue dancing in them. Woah, this was majorly cool. I morphed quickly back to normal with a mere thought and blinked. Wow, that was surprisingly easy to get the hang of. I shook my head and went back into my room and looked at the clock. 5:30 in the morning. Well, I certainly wasn't going to go back to sleep tonight. I got dressed and ran through a mental schedule for the day. Usually I went for a run with Steve, being the only member of the team that could actually keep up with him running. Yeah, did I mention I also had enhanced physical ability? Well, I do, and its helped me on more than one occasion. Anyway, so I got dressed in my shorts, t-shirt and running shoes and went downstairs, fully expecting no one to be up. But Steve was up. He raised his eyebrows when he saw me.

"Up so early?" he asked.

I yawned and grabbed a water bottle. "Woke up and couldn't go back to sleep."

"Same here," he sighed, then smiled. "Ready for an extra early run?"

I smiled back. "You bet I am."

When we got back from our run, Clint was in the kitchen. He immediately started talking when Steve walked out.

"JARVIS picked up something weird on the security footage early this morning. Was that really you?" his eyes widened.  
I nodded and yawned again. "New power."

"Really?" he bounced around me. "Show me."

I rolled my eyes and morphed, then instantly felt a little of my energy drain away and lightheaded. Ok, so no morphing randomly. Got it. Clint, meanwhile, was still bouncing up and down.

"That's so cool!" he burst out, then looked me up and down. "Wow, your huge!" He was right. When he was standing I came up to the middle of his arm, and that was when I was still sitting. Then, "I have a good idea, here's the plan."

I crept down to the lab behind Clint. This was another one of his crazy schemes. Steve and Tone were down in the lab, and Clint wanted me to jump into the room and growl, hopefully scaring them. That didn't

mean I was comfortable with it. Clint opened the door and went into the lab. I stayed there and a few seconds, then jumped into the room, a growl rumbling in my throat and my teeth bared. Steve screamed like a girl and he fell backward, and Tony's eyes widened almost comically as he backpedaled. I sat down and scoffed silently. Clint was laughing.

"Guys," he said finally. "That's Sarah. She has a morphing power now."

Steve got up from where he had fallen and looked at me.

"So you're a wolf?" he asked.

I rolled my green eyes. 'No, I'm still human,' I thought.

'No,' a sudden growly voice said in my head. 'Only half.'

'Wait,' I thought. 'Are you in my head?'

'Of course.'

'Who are you?'

'I am the Wolf, I am your guide.'

'Oooookkaaaaayyy,' I said, somewhat hesitantly. I was shaken from my thoughts by a gasp from the doorway. It was Bruce, brown eyes wide.

"W-what is that?" he asked, pointing a trembling finger at me.

"Hi, Brucie," I said. "Its' me Sarah. It's just a new power, so, ya know, don't hulk out or anything." But all that came out was a growl. Whoops, I guess I was speaking canine. Steve jumped in.

"It's Sarah," he said. "Well, her new power."

Bruce hesitantly walked toward me. Hmm, what would make him know it was me…. Oh yeah. I crossed my eyes and stuck out my tongue. He laughed and looked down at me.

"Hi Sarah," his eyes twinkled. "I'd know that face anywhere."

Suddenly something landed on my back, making all four of my legs splay out as I landed with an "Oomph." Tony was sitting on me.

"Oh come on," he whined, scowling and crossing his arms. "I wanna ride you."

I narrowed my eyes and glared, growling. He put his hands up and got off me. I got up and stalked toward him menacingly, still growling. Tony had the decency to play along and pretend to look terrified. Natasha picked that moment to walk in, of course. The first thing she did was pull her gun. I yelped and ran behind Steve, peeking out from behind his back.

"Natasha!" Steve yelled. "Don't, its Sarah!"

"Really?" she asked, skeptical. I morphed, still hiding behind Steve. Natasha, thankfully, puts her gun down.

"New power?" she asked, eyebrows raised.

"Oh yeah," I said. "Tony tried to ride me."

"Then I don't blame you for growling at him."

'You should have attacked him' the wolf suddenly growled.

'No way!' I thought. 'He's my friend, m-my family!'

'Wolves don't have family, they have packs,' he growled. 'And if this is your sorry excuse for a pack, then you should be the alpha, not a human!'

'Not just a human,' I retorted. 'A smart leader, with physical ability enhanced by the super soldier serum.'

'You are a hybrid! He is not! Your so called "family" will betray you, and then where will you be? Right where you were before. Broken, helpless, pitiful-'

"Get out of my head!" I accidently yelled aloud.

"Sarah!" someone yelled at me, shaking my shoulders. My eyes snapped opened to reveal a concerned Bruce looking at me from inches away. Then I realized I was on the ground and being supported by Steve behind me, and Bruce was in front of me, concern and slight panic on his features. I blinked and he rocked back on his heels.

"What was that?" he asked. "You just collapsed."

I shrugged, then forced a smile. "Nothing," I lied. "I'm gonna go practice."

I pushed past everyone silently and retrieved my bow from my room. Steve found me in the training room a little while later.

"You okay?" he asked quietly, looking into my eyes. I sat down heavily and wiped my forehead.

"I'm fine," I huffed, slightly winded from the obstacle course I just went through. I didn't meet his gaze.

"I think we both know that's not true."

I sighed, of all the people who could read me, Steve understood me the best. "Just…there was this wolf dude talking to me in my head." I buried my head in my hands. "I'm going crazy," I whispered.

He put his hand under my chin and lifted my head up. "You are NOT crazy," he said gently. "Just tell me what happened."

"He started saying stuff like you need to find a better pack and stuff. I don't know, he's extremely annoying."

Steve smiled slightly. "Just put him in his place."

I smile back. Steve's smile is irresistible, and just seeing it made me feel better. Steve stood up and offered me his hand.

"Wanna spar?


	4. Chapter 4

Okkkk, short chapter. So I'm posting it with two more! enjoy! :D

Later that night, I ended up in my room, then sighed and picked up my phone. I scrolled down and found Bruce in my contacts.

"Hey," I texted him. "Where are you?"

"Down in my room, why?" he answered a few moments later.

"Can I talk to you?"

"Sure, come on down."

I made my way down to Bruce's room and knocked on the door. He let me in, and I collapsed on his bed face first. Bruce laid on the couch on his stomach, resting his elbows on the armrest and his chin in his hands.

"Does the other guy ever talk to you?" I asked, mumbling into the bed.

"What?" he asked, cracking a small smile. "I don't speak mumble."

I turned my head to look at him. "Does the other guy ever talk to you, like, ya know, inside your head?"

To my surprise, he nodded. "Why, who talks to you?"

"Since my power developed, this wolf dude keeps bothering me."

"Not bothering you," he growled in my head.

"Shut up," I accidently said out loud, the smiled sheepishly at Bruce. "Um….like that.

"What's he say?" Bruce asked, still in his position on the couch. I sighed.

"Stuff like find a real pack and if you wanna keep this one you gotta become the alpha." I buried my head in my hands. "Stuff like that. It's annoying."

"I'm not annoying," he says.

"Yes, you are!" I shout in my head. "You are SO annoying!" I glare at the air since I can't glare at the wolf.

"I used to have the same problem," Bruce smiled gently, coming over and putting a hand on my shoulder. "Just show him who's boss. If he helps you, then fine. But if he tells you something you don't want to do, then just ignore it."

I smiled. "Thanks Bruce."

"No problem," he replied. Then Steve walked in, carrying something. I look closely. Its Monopoly. I LOVE Monopoly. My eyes lit up.

"Can I play?" I asked. Steve looked slightly surprised to see me in there, but consented.

"Sure," he said. We set up the game, started playing, and then Bruce went bankrupt.

"I hate this game!" he announced loudly, throwing his hands up and collapsing backwards. I stifled a laugh.

"Wanna keep playing?" I asked Steve. He shrugged. "Then to the death!" I yelled dramatically, rolling the dice. Steve won in the end, but we decided to play one more game. This time I lost first, landing on one of Steve's developed properties. I handed over all my money and properties, then watched them continue the game. Soon I started getting tired, and leaned against Steve and felt my eyes flicker closed. I woke up, barely, when Steve picked me up.

"Gosh Sarah," he whispered. "You need to start eating more, you barely weigh anything."

I smiled slightly, then drifted off again.

I woke up early the next morning, silently cursing the thunderstorm moving through. The storm was one of the more severe ones, the soundproofing in the walls not nearly blocking out all the noise. I groaned, dressed, and trudged toward the kitchen. Tony was there, doing something on his phone.

"Hey Sarah," he greeted me. "Thunderstorm?"

I nodded, yawning. "What else?"

I made myself some cereal and sat down beside him.

"So," he shut down his phone and looked at me. "Summer break is almost over, you sad?"

"Duh, glowstick," I said, lacking my usual sarcasm. I was too tired to try, though I did include my self-appointed nickname for him. "School starts in what, two weeks?"

Tony nodded. "Fury said that one of us should school you. I volunteered. Since you'll be gone a lot for missions, you can't go to a regular school."

I looked at him, surprised. It must have shown on my face.

"What?" he shrugged. "You're staring tenth grade. You're already really smart and can do eleventh grade work, so it should be easy to get done by Christmas."

"Thanks," I smiled, then hugged him. He awkwardly hugged me back.

"No problem," he replied. I took a bite of my cereal. "Lessons start in two weeks," he smirked. I grimaced.

"So, what do ya wanna do today?" I asked. Suddenly my comm link crackled to life.

"Lynn, Rogers!" Fury yelled. (Seriously, did he ever STOP yelling?) "Mission! We're sending a quin-jet, be ready."

"Yessir," I said. Steve didn't respond, so I figured he was still asleep. I turned to Tony and made a face. "Scratch that," I sighed. "Mission, I gotta go wake up Steve."

"K, be careful," Tony looked at me as I started toward the stairs. Suddenly, I turned around, smirking.

"I figured out my family tree," I said, amused.

"Oh?" Tony asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Well, Steve's my dad, 'cause he's so overprotective and stuff. Natasha's my mom, you and Bruce are the uncle's, and Clint is the crazy cousin," I laughed. Tony laughed too, and I turned to leave.

"Be careful, kid," Tony said again.

"Don't worry Uncle Glowstick," I smirked. "I will." And as I went up the stairs, I could hear Tony laughing softly behind me.


	5. Chapter 5

1 month later

"TONY!" I yelled, stomping into the kitchen. His head jerked up, and upon seeing my expression, his hands went up also.

"What?" he asked.

I held up my bow. "Did you do this?"

"Maybe," he replied, obviously hiding a smile. It had paint ALL over it. I'm not sure what it was supposed to look like, it just looked like he dipped it in random colors of paint.

"Weeellll…..I just dipped it in random colors of paint," he said, trying to look innocent. I facepalmed. The Clint stormed in, followed by Steve. Clint held up his bow, which looked like mine and Steve shield had Patrick painted on it in place of the star. Natasha walked in holding up her throwing knives, which had SpongeBob painted all over them, then Bruce walked in.

"Why is there a picture of the other guy on my wall with a moustache?" he asked, raising his eyebrows. We all pointed to Tony. Then Pepper walked in, having heard the whole conversation.

"Do you know what they get to do now Tony?" she smirked. Tony's face got considerably paler.

"OH YEAH!" I exclaimed, rushing down to the lab. Clint and Natasha were right behind me, with Steve and Bruce following a little slower.

"I call the mark nine!" I yelled, looking up at it. We all claimed one of Tony's suits, except Bruce, who just said he'd share with me. Tony ran down and tried to open the door.

"I'm sorry sir," Jarvis electronic voice sounded. "You have been restricted access to this area."

So Tony plastered his face to the window, watching as we repainted his beautiful suits. Hours later, Tony had gone upstairs, and we were all just lounging around talking. Me and Clint were arguing good naturedly about whether bigfoot existed, with Bruce occasionally throwing in a scientific comment, looking amused. Tony came downstairs and tried the door. It opened. He rushed inside and stared at his once red and gold suits in disbelief. Natasha had done a spiderman theme, the suit being red and blue and the helmet being a spidey mask. Clint had just painted a clothes and a crazy face, and Steve's was all red, white, and blue. Mine and Bruce's, well, it turns out I can paint, and so can Bruce, so we decided to make a Tony...um…portrait, I guess. And between the two of us we managed to create a fairly realistic looking Tony image. I smirked and Bruce fist bumped me under the table.

"WHAT DID YOU DO?!" he finally burst out.

"Revenge, Tony!" Clint yelled. "We had to avenge our weapons colorful death!" Everyone laughed.

"Oh come on, Tony," Pepper smiled. "You only have twenty more."

"But I liked those," he pouted, then turned to mine and Bruce's. "I do like this one though."

"That would be ours," I raised both our hands, then suddenly yawned and dropped them. "Ok, guys," I announced. "I'm tired, and it's late, so I'm gonna head off to bed."

There were variations of goodnight all around the room, then I went up the stairs to my room. And my last thought before falling asleep was, 'I really have a family now.'

-linebreak-

My little brother Luke squealed as he tackled me to the ground. I laughed and tickled him, his blue eyes sparkling and his babyish laugh filling my room.

"You're home!" he exclaimed, hugging me fiercely.

"I'm home," I laughed. "I was only at school." I ruffled his hair, then kissed his forehead. "How was your day?" I picked him up off of me and set him on my bed, listening as he rambled on about preschool and pancakes.

"And I had lots of siwup!" he finished, waving his hands around excitedly.

"Syrup?" I laughed.

"Yeah, siwup!" He started talking again, and I absentmindly made an ice crystal in my hand, spinning it and listening to Luke. He finally finished talking, and I looked at him as he stared at the crystal in my hand. He was small for four years old, with a head full of blonde hair he got from Mom, while I got dad's black color. I crossed my legs and plopped him into my lap, letting him watch as I shaped in into something. I had gotten good at it, able to shape most things, but this was going to be different. I shaped it gently, the crystal slowly taking the shape of a necklace. I shaped a delicate chain, then painstakingly formed a locket. I let it drop into my hand, surprised I could actually form the thing. The front was blank, but it opened and inside there was a separator, allowing four pictures to be placed inside.

"More!" Luke clapped, content to watch me work. I put my arm around him.

"What do you want on the front?" I asked him.

"You!" he exclaimed.

"Me?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yeah, Sarah Wolf!" he looked up at me, craning his neck to look backwards. Sarah Wolf was what he called me when I was a wolf.

"Ok," I laughed, not exactly believing that I could make it. "I'll try." I made the necklace float above my hand again slowly shaped the front. It looked really easy, but it really wasn't. It took me a year to actually learn to make shapes, much less designs. But after a half hour, I got it. The outline of a wolf howling graced the front of the locket. Luke stared at it.

"Sarah wolf!" he exclaimed. "You made you as wolf!"

"Yeah, Luke," I smiled. He started to put it on. "Hey," I said. "I made that for me." Luke's face fell as I took the locket. I made the chain shorter. "But if you're gonna have it," I smiled as his eyes lit up. "Then we've gotta take some pictures. How 'bout we take some?"

"Yeah!" he grinned. I turned on my picture printer and grabbed my digital camera, quickly snapping pictures, then printing and cutting them to fit. We put them in the locket, then I put it one Luke, the locket glowing a faint blue.

"Cool!" he exclaimed, then kissed my cheek. "Thanks you so much!"

"You're welcome," I laughed. "It's a little girly, don't ya think?"

"No!" he yelped. "I love it!"

"Well, good then," I hugged him.

"And I'm gonna keep it on forever!" he yelled, then fell silent for a moment. "Let's go for a ride," he suddenly said.

"Now?" I asked. He nodded, his eyes lighting up. "Okay," I said, picking him up and walking down the stairs.

"Mom?" I called. She emerged from the kitchen, blond hair pulled back into a ponytail. Dad appeared behind her, brown eyes sparkling. I was a mixture of the two, getting Dad's black hair and Mom's blue eyes.

"Yeah?" she asked, spoon in hand.

"I'm gonna take Lukie here to the park, then we'll stop by the farm," I smiled as Dad took Mom's spoon and stuck it in his mouth. Mom turned to him.

"David, I was still using that," she laughed.

"It's cookie dough, hon," Dad smiled past the spoon. "I can't resist." Mom rolled her eyes good-naturedly and turned back to me.

"Okay, just be back by six. Dinner'll be ready by then, and I made cookies and pie," she said. Luke squealed and I hugged her.

"That sounds amazing," I said.

"What?" Dad smiled at me, eyes twinkling. "I don't get a hug?" I rolled my eyes, laughed, and hugged him too. Luke squirmed to be let down, then climbed onto a chair.

"Piggyback!" he exclaimed. I laughed and let him climb onto me, then went out the door.

"Be careful, love you!" Mom and Dad both exclaimed at the same time, then laughed. I chuckled and walked the few clocks to the park. Luke swung for a while, all the time squealing for me to push him higher. Soon he got bored and we walked to the outskirts of town, where we owned A LOT of land and a quaint little farm house. Not to mention the huge barn and hayloft. So whenever Lukie wanted a ride, this was where we came. There were tons of open fields to run in, and Luke absolutely LOVED to hit one of those fields and go fast.

"Ok, ready?" I asked as we got to the barn.

"Yep," he nodded. I morphed into "Sarah Wolf" and bent down for him to get on.

"Hold on tight okay?" I told him in my head. When I was a wolf we had a kind of mental link that we used to talk. Well, I did. Luke usually just talked out loud.

"Okay," he said, wrapping his arms around my neck and burying his face in my fur. I walked slowly, then picked up speed until I was trotting, then running. Luke, squealed, laughing squeezing me. I ran slowly through the woods, but then we hit the field. I accelerated until I was streaking across the long field, a barely distinguishable black blur. I jumped over the fence, slowing slightly as we entered the horses pasture. Most of the horses barely looked up as we ran by, but the little filly and colt we had named Star and Midnight ran beside us, neighing shrilly. I jumped over the other end of the fence, slowing to a trot as we entered the woods. We turned left, heading down the treeline until the field, once acres and acres of farmland, widened out. I turned at the treeline and went along the field for a little, then went straight up into the woods when the treeline once again turned. I climbed up the hill, reaching the clearing at the top and laying down in the soft grass. Luke tumbled off my back and curled up against me. We called this our little mountain. We came up here a lot. It overlooked the town, and we could see everything from up here. My eyes closed and Luke fell asleep on me. I woke up to Luke poking me. I looked at him.

"What?" I asked him in my head.

"I wanna finish our ride," he said, blue eyes sparkling.

"Okay," I yawned, pushing myself to my paws, then bending down for Luke to climb onto me. He did, and clasped his hands around my neck. I walked down the hill, then trotted into the woods. We emerged into the field. This time there was no pasture in the way, just five miles of open fields. I started running as soon as we emerged from the woods, and soon we were streaking across the ground, Luke quiet and enjoying the moment. I barely even felt as if my paws were even touching the ground. I had endurance, so running five miles at top speed was no problem for me. We son reached the barn, and I bent down so Luke could climb off of me. I morphed quickly, then checked my watch.

"Its five-fifty, bud," I said. "I'm glad you woke me up." I took his hand and we walked toward town. We reached the house right on time, the smell of freshly baked cookies greeting us as we walked in the door. Dinner was amazing, then I went into my room and tumbled into bed and was half asleep when the door creaked open. Luke slid into bed beside me.

"What, buddy?" I mumbled.

"I'm gonna sleep with you," he whispered, covering up.

"Okay," I said softly, already falling asleep. "G'night."

"G'night," he whispered. "Love you."

"Love you too."

The next morning I got up for school quietly, not wanting to wake Luke up. I finished getting ready and was about to leave when I realized my backpack was still in my room. I slipped in and got it, then covered Luke up more.

"Where're ya goin'?" he mumbled, still half asleep.

"School," I whispered. "I'll see you this afternoon, okay?"

"'Kay," he slurred. "Can we go for another ride?"

"Sure, Lukie," I smiled and kissed his forehead, slipping out of the room. I noticed he was wearing his locket.

"Bye Mom, bye Dad," I hugged them both on my way out the door.

"Bye, honey," Dad said. "Love you, have a good day at school."

"Bye Sarah," Mom smiled. "Love you, when are you gonna be home today?"

"Well, I don't have track, so I should be home by three thirty." She nodded. "Okay, love you too," I smiled. "Both of you."

And I walked to school, already looking forward to my ride this afternoon with Luke.

"Bye!" I called to my friend Jessie as we parted at the corner when school was over.

"Bye!" she called. "See you tomorrow!" I grinned as she waved and waved back. I walked down the sidewalk toward my house and looked at my watch. It was 4:15. Whoops, I was later than I'd said I'd be. I started across the street. The house exploded.

I woke up screaming, tumbling off the bed and landing on the floor in a sobbing heap, the covers tangled around me. I stayed on the floor, sobbing into my arms, until my door opened and someone picked me up and set me gently on the bed, rubbing small comforting circles on my back. All my grief came back in waves, and I cried until I could cry no more. Eventually the sobs dissipated into hiccups and I looked up. It was Steve. I sat up quickly, crossing my legs and wiping my eyes, embarrassed.

"I'm sorry," I murmured. "I woke you up."

"No you didn't," he smiled gently. "I was awake." We sat in comfortable silence for a few seconds.

"Do you ever do that?" I asked suddenly. "Dream about what you had?"

"That's…..why I was up," he said, looking down.

"I-I dreamed about the day leading up to the accident and….." I bit my lip, tearing up once again.

"I know," Steve said gently, putting a comforting hand on my arm. "And I'm sorry. It must have been really hard for you."

"It still is," I hiccupped. "I made my little brother a locket the day before and….." I gave a shuddering sigh. "And it was all they ever found of him. My parents…they had DNA left at least, but Luke just….." I clenched my teeth, determined to keep from crying and failing miserably. I looked around my room.

"I don't know where the locket is," I murmured. "Haven't seen it in forever."

"Wanna look for it?" Steve said softly. I hesitated, the got up and rummaged through my personal drawers. It was at the bottom on the bottom one. I held it up by its delicate chain and sat down beside Steve once again, who put an arm around me as I opened it. All the pictures were taken by me, so my arm was outstretched for most of them. The first one was of me sitting cross-legged on my bed, Luke in my lap and both of us smiling brightly up at the camera. The second one was of me as a wolf, Luke on my back and burying his face in my fur. The third one was of me as a human once again, this time Luke on my shoulders and grinning. The last one was of my whole family, at the farm in the hayloft. I was on my stomach on a haybale, Luke sitting on my back. Mom and Dad were on either side of me, sitting cross-legged and smiling brightly. I bit my lip, I had forgotten about the locket. Steve looked closely at the pictures, then hugged me.

"Try to get some sleep kiddo," he said gently. "I'll see you in the morning." He left me alone with my thoughts, and soon I fell asleep.


	6. Chapter 6

The next morning I was in a considerably better mood, and bounced down to the kitchen for breakfast. I had my locket on, the only reminder of what had happened last night. I ate breakfast quickly, then headed down to the lab for school. I usually got all my work done by noon, and I was moving through the lessons so quickly that Tony declared I would be done for the year in no time. Tony was a surprisingly good teacher, and paired with Bruce, it was amazing how much I was learning. I didn't see anyone on my way down to the lab, which I thought was odd. There was usually someone in the kitchen, and I usually even ran into someone else on the way down. I shook my head and pushed open the lab door.

"Surprise!" Everyone yelled. I blinked.

"What's the occasion?" I asked. Pepper came up and hugged me.

"It's your birthday, silly. Remember? November 12th."

I shrugged and smiled sheepishly. "I kinda forgot."

"Yeah," Clint walked up to me and handed me something. "Happy Birthday." It was a package, wrapped in red paper. I opened it. It was a brand new bow, dark blue and purple in color. I squealed and squeezed Clint.

"Thank you thank you thank you! It's beautiful!" I notched an imaginary arrow and let it go. It was better than my old bow, better fitting my height and easier to hold. By the time gift giving was done, I had a new bow and arrows, a new outfit from Pepper, a snuggie with a wolf on it from Natasha, and earrings from Steve. Tony was the last one, and he handed me a watch that was made to look like that arc reactor, with a clear band with blue lights in it. In all, it looked really cool.

"Did you make this?" I asked, putting it on.

"Yep," he nodded. After hugs all around, we went upstairs for a day of fun.

That evening, we were all taking turns playing MarioCart. Thor had showed up that afternoon and crushed me in a hug.

"Lady Sarah!" he had exclaimed. "I have missed you! And I have come to wish you a happy birth-day!"

"Thanks Thor," I had laughed, gently prying him off me.

Anyway, that night when we were all playing MarioCart, Bruce texted me. I looked around and suddenly realized he had slipped away.

"What's up?" I texted him back.

"Can you come up to my room for a sec?" he asked.

"Sure," I said. "Be right up."

I slipped away from the others, smirking slightly as Clint beat them all in the race. I went up the stairs, then padded down the hallway in my socks and knocked on his door. He let me in, then sat down.

"I wanted to give you this in private," he smiled, holding up a small package. "It's your birthday present."

I opened it slowly. It was a notebook. I flipped through it. It was filled with notes. I looked up at him questioningly.

"Its notes on how I got and keep the other guy under control. I thought you could use it now."

I smiled and hugged him. "Thanks Bruce, I really appreciate it."

"No problem," he grinned, then noticed my locket. "What's that?"

"A locket," I said. "I made it."

He reached for it. ""May I?"

I shrugged and unlatched it, handing it to him. He studied the front.

"You said you made this?" Surprise showed on his face. I nodded. "When?" he asked.

"Late May of this year?" I guessed.

"It's beautiful," he breathed, then opened it carefully, studying the pictures. "Was….was this your brother?" he asked hesitantly.

"Yeah," I smiled sadly. "It was the day before the accident."

"But," his eyebrows furrowed. "I thought you said morphing into a wolf was a NEW power, and here you're a wolf.

I jumped up and snatched the locket, studying the pictures again. He was right, of course.

"You're right," I said, looking up at him. "But that wouldn't make sense unless…." I stopped. It made perfect sense. How easy I was able to master the power, my dream, the wolf, how it felt natural the moment I transformed. "I think," I plopped into a chair. "It's time to have a chat with the Wolf.

"Are you sure?" Bruce looked at me. I nodded, and Bruce moved around to the back of the chair and put his hands on my shoulders. "Just make sure you can feel me here."

"Got it," I smiled and closed my eyes.

"What?" he asked instantly. "Wait, don't answer that, I know what. Just tell me what exactly you want to know."

I decided to start with the basics. I only had a million questions swimming around in my brain, best to start with the big one.

"How come I could morph before, then forgot all about it and discovered it as a new power?"

The wolf sighed. "After the accident, you woke up at the farm and couldn't remember anything for the past two weeks, correct?"

"Yeah….I was knocked unconscious by the explosion, but no, I don't remember anything for two weeks after the accident.

"That's because They got you."

"T-they couldn't have gotten me, I wouldn't be alive right now."

"You would if I took control and got you out."

Silence. "Then what did They do to me?" I whispered.

"The first time They got you, They injected you with wolf DNA, mixed with a recreation of the super-soldier serum and many other ingredients. But the serum didn't work, wasn't exactly right. But instead of killing you as it did others, it gave you abilities. Your ice powers, for example. It also created me."

I was silent, processing the information.

He went on. "The second time, They tested you, wondering why you survived the first time. That's why you have the scar."

"The Scar" was the huge scar running up and down the length of my stomach. It hurt a lot most all the time, and when it didn't, it tingled a little, then started hurting even more. Sadly, I had almost gotten used to it, thought it was always at the back of my mind.

After a silence, I asked, "Why don't I remember any of it?"

"I have been withholding the memories. They tried a different version of the serum the second time, giving you the rest of your powers. It suppressed me for a little bit, but I've fought through it, that's why you discovered me as a new power." A pause. "I'll release the memories now."

A flood of images instantly assaulted my brain, none of them pleasant. I snapped my eyes open and blinked, then stood up, feeling slightly dizzy. Bruce looked at me.

"Get answers?" he asked.

"All of them," I said. "I just don't like most of them." I told him the whole episode. His eyes widened, and he hugged me.

"They were recreating the serum," he looked me in the eyes. "The team needs to know about this. If they succeed, they could build an army of super soldiers and….." he trailed off, shaking his head.

"I can tell them," I said, looking toward the door. "You're right, they need to know." He nodded and followed me down the stairs. I relayed the whole episode to Steve, who relayed it to Fury, who decided to do absolutely nothing for the moment, which aggravated me.

"Sarah," Steve said hesitantly. "You know what this means, right?"

"Yeah," I sighed. "That I'll be going back to the source of my nightmares."

"When Fury decides to do something, anyway."

"Yeah, there's that."

Steve started away, but I put a hand on his arm, stopping him.

"Steve, I-," I stopped, then sighed. "I really appreciate what you did for me last night. That means more to me than you know."

He smiled gently. "And you mean more to me then you could ever imagine."


	7. Chapter 7

2 months later

Everything was normal after that. Fury still didn't do anything, but he HAD moved into a building in New York, which made it way easier for debriefings. And by normal I mean as normal as my life can get. But then one day I was in the training room with Steve. It was the normal routine for me, pretty easy stuff. We had already sparred a bit, and now I was running through the interactive obstacle course. I was supposed to do some purely physical stuff, then freeze some stuff, then blast some stuff with ectoblasts. It went good up until the ectoblasts. Something was swinging toward my head, and I held up my hand lit it up with energy, but suddenly the energy dissipated. My eyebrows furrowed and I looked down at my hand in confusion, then suddenly heard Steve's warning yell and looked up. The thing was still swinging toward me. I yelped and ducked, falling flat on the floor and felling it whoosh over me. Steve stopped the course, then came over to where I was now standing.

"What was that?" he asked, concern lacing his voice.

"I don't know," I said, confused. "Maybe if I tried again…," I murmured. As soon as the glow began, however, I knew something was very wrong. The first clue was that the scar instantly felt like it was on fire, then it spread. Suddenly everything hurt, and then everything went black.

I awoke with a jolt, jerking up to a sitting position and breathing hard.

"Hey," Bruce was instantly at my side. "Easy. You've only been out an hour."

At that instant a headache pounded into existence.

"What happened?" I mumbled, cradling my head in my hands.

"Do you have a headache?" Bruce asked, noticing my behavior.

I looked up and stared at him. "You're avoiding the question."

Bruce looked down and opened his mouth, ready to answer, but at that instant Steve rushed in and instantly embraced me.

"You're okay!" he exclaimed.

"Why wouldn't I be?" I asked. "What happened?"

Steve and Bruce exchanged glances. I raised an eyebrow at their odd, secretive behavior.

"Wha-," Steve hesitated. "What do you remember?"

"I remember my ectoblasts wouldn't work, and…." I paused, my eyebrows furrowing. "Then nothing else."

Steve put a hand on my shoulder. "We think your powers glitched somehow."

I blinked. That's it? They glitched?

"What about my powers?" I asked. They both shrugged.

I tried to light up my hand with ecto-energy. Nothing. I tried my ice powers and breathed a sigh of relief when they flared to life in my hand.

"Soooo, I lost my ectoblasts. Got it."

"Steve!" I called, sticking my head into the kitchen. No luck. Stevie was nowhere to be found. Worry welled up inside me. Steve ALWAYS told people where he would be, and if he was unaccounted for, there was a BIG problem.

"JARVIS?" I asked for the bazillionth time. "So you have NO idea where Steve is?"

"No, but might I suggest the meeting room. It is nearly the last place you have not yet checked."

'Thanks Jarv, I'll do that," I shook my head and headed down toward the meeting room. Why was I even trying? Why would Steve be THERE of all places. Probably another dead end. I sighed and punched the button in the elevator. The ding sounded, the doors slid opened, and I walked out. And almost collided with none other than Fury and Steve.

"Steve!" I exclaimed, hugging him out of sheer relief. "You're okay!"

He looked puzzled and slightly awkward, out of character for him. "Of course I'm okay," he answered. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Because you've been missing for TWO WHOLE HOURS!" I waved my arms around. "I've been worried sick! Jarvis said you weren't in the building. Where were you?"

Steve looked hesitantly over at Fury as if wondering what to say. My eyes narrowed.

"Ok, what happened? Where were you? And why were you with Director Eye Patch here? The truth, Rogers."

"I was…in the meeting room," he said hesitantly. "Fury hacked into Jarvis and blocked his scanners."

"Wait, what?" I interrupted him. "You were in the meeting room for two whole hours? What for?"

This time Fury glanced at Steve. I put my hands on my hips and tapped my foot impatiently. They were definitely hiding something.

"Ok, what going on here?"

Steve sighed. "We were talking about you," he said quietly.

My eyebrows furrowed. "M-me? Why?"

"It-it was about your brother."

My heart skipped a beat and time slowed down. Luke? Luke's alive? But how? That's not just impossible, its- more than impossible! My thoughts racing a mile a minute, I looked up at them, eyes wide.

"Luke?" I managed a whisper.

Steve nodded.

"But….that's not possible. The house BLEW UP! The whole thing was one big fireball!"

Steve put a hand on my shoulder. "We think he's being held somewhere. It might be the same people who got to you."

"Where?" I asked, my voice suddenly cold. "Where is he?"

"We don't know," Fury suddenly stepped in. "We're working on it."

"And you," I suddenly whirled on him. "How long have you known about this and didn't tell me?"

He sighed. "Please calm down, Lynn. We've known for a few months but-"

After that, it was all a big white blur in my head, until I woke up.

I cracked my eyes open, trying to think past the tremendous headache I had. What just happened? I blinked and sat up.

"Whoa," I whispered and grabbed my head as everything pitched sideways. I was SO dizzy right now. I squeezed my eyes shut until the feeling passed, then opened my eyes again. Only to see Bruce's brown eyes millimeters from mine. I yelped and scooted back, then laughed slightly.

"Geez, Bruce, personal space bubble," I grinned. He didn't return the smile. "What's wrong?" My smile vanished.

He sighed. "Sarah-" he looked down, then met my eyes. "Do you remember anything for the past hour?"

I blinked. Dejavu here, how many times have I had this conversation?

"N-no, it's all a blur," I said. "What happened?"

"You….attacked Fury and Steve."

My eyes widened and my breathing hitched.

"What?" I breathed, my voice barely audible.

"You morphed into a wolf."

I looked down and blinked. "A-are they okay?"

"They're both a little scratched up, but yeah, they're fine."

I buried my head in my hands and clenched my teeth.

"Why?" I asked in my head. "Why did you take control?"

"You were angry, and let me out," his growly voice replied.

"No, I didn't LET you out, you FORCED your way out."

'Is there a difference?"

"Yes! You hurt my friends!"

"But they're not MY friends are they?" he snarled. I was silent for a moment.

"No, but they're mine, and you should respect that," I finally replied.

"They are not worthy of respect!"

"They are my family!"

"Wolves do not have family!"

Silence. "This one does."

"They will abandon you."

"I don't believe you."

"Then that's your loss."

I opened my eyes and blinked, knowing we were done talking. I sighed and looked up at Bruce.

"He forced his way out."

"I gathered," he said. "Knowing you would never consciously do that. But why did he do it, and how?" he asked.

"I let my guard down. I was angry and," I sighed. "It was a perfect opportunity for him."

"Ah, I see. So just don't aggravate you?" he joked.

I laughed. "No, now that I know what can happen, I can keep a lid on it."

Then Steve and Fury walked in and I fell silent as Bruce took them to the corner of the room to explain what had happened. Then they all came over to me. Steve didn't look too bad, just a few scratches, but Fury had some deeper cuts on his arm. I opened my mouth to apologize a bazillion times, but Steve stopped me.

"Are you ok?" he asked, concern in his eyes.

I was stunned. "Why wouldn't I be? Ae you okay?"

"I'm fine," Steve replied. "But I had to hit you pretty hard to get you out. Does your head hurt?"

"I'm fine," I said, then smirked. "What did you do, hit me with your shield?"

"Actually, yeah," Steve looked at me and said softly, "And it's the hardest thing I've ever had to do."

I was silent for a moment, staring into Steve's endless blue eyes. Then Fury interrupted.

"Ok Lynn," he said. "For reasons of my own I'm going to choose to ignore the incident. And I'm gonna pick up where we left off, only now we have more information."

I looked at him, eyes shining with hope, though I said nothing. Fury hesitated.

"He's in a lab."

"W-what?" I stared at him.

"We think it's the same lab you were in," he announced.

I looked down. But that would mean he's with the same people and- oh no. I looked up.

"We've got to get him out of there."

Steve gave a slightly amused smirk. "That's what I said."


	8. Chapter 8

The plan was that me, Steve, and Natasha would go in first. Fury had pinpointed the location, even getting blueprints to the hidden building. Once we gave the all clear, Clint and Tony would follow us in, and Brucie wouldn't hulk out unless things got bad. We were all set. The building was big, even hidden in the mountain like it was, and so Steve thought it best that we split up. I was with Steve, Natasha was with Clint, and Tony, being kinda invincible with his suit on, was by himself. The mission? Free as many mutants as possible. There was only one drawback.

"Alaska?!" I exclaimed, looking at the tablet screen. "Why would it be in Alaska?"

Natasha looked over my shoulder. "Sparsely populated," she said. "It's perfect. No one would ever see them without atmospheric sensors."

"Which, fortunately, we have access to," I smirked.

"Yep, and UNfortuantely for them," she chuckled.

I shivered. "I bet its freezing."

She looked at me and smirked. "Oh yes, VERY freezing."

Luckily shield had nearly limitless supplies, and soon we were all fitted with very light, very warm, outfits. And so a few days later we were all on a small quin-jet, headed for Alaska.

"So you know the plan?" Steve asked, sitting down beside me. I nodded.

"Yep," I said. "Get in, split up with the others but stay with you, avoid or take out guards, free as many of the mutants as possible, and get out."

Steve nodded his approval. I soon got bored and pulled out my phone, playing candy crush saga. Then I lost all my lives and started scrolling through my pictures. I laughed as I found a picture of Steve doing a funny face.

"What?" he asked, leaning over to see what I was laughing at. "Hey!" He exclaimed, trying to grab my phone. "Delete that!"

"No way!" I laughed and scooted back to avoid him, but ended falling off the end of my seat and onto the floor with an "oomph." I poked my head up with an annoyed expression, while Steve was trying his hardest not to burst into laughter. I plopped back into my seat and held the phone up.

"Selfie," I smiled. He smiled too, and I snapped the picture. "Now a funny face," I said. I crossed my eyes and tuck out my tongue, snapping the picture. I looked at both of them. The first one wasn't that bad, but the second one was absolutely hilarious. Besides the fact that I looked like a complete idiot, Steve had done a crooked smile and crossed his eyes, giving me bunny ears. I laughed and set it as my wallpaper. He rolled his eyes but chuckled at the picture. My head shot up at the announcement.

"Approaching landing zone," the intercom buzzed to life. "Stand by for landing."

Steve snapped on his helmet. "Ready?" he asked.

"Ready," I nodded, securing my bow and arrows on my back. The jet slowly landed, and we all jumped out. The pilot lifted off and flew out of sight. I knew that he would fly a few miles away, then landed hidden, so that we could get on safely without being seen. We were a mile from the place. Tony immediately powered up his thrusters and flew straight up, from where he would get an elevated view and be waiting on us. The four of us started walking. The first thing I did was fall into a huge snow drift, from which Steve rescued me, laughing. The second thing I did was morph, then trot slightly ahead of the others. Now I could tread on top of the snow with my wolfie paws. I stopped and sniffed the air, suddenly aware of something other than snow and ice. Blood. I instinctively backed up, making me bump into Steve, who looked at me with a confused expression. I shook my head and bounded up the hill beside him. We all suddenly stopped as we came over the rise. We were here. It looked like a normal cave, but we knew better, and soon we were creeping across the frozen landscape toward the entrance. We reached it, and Tony and Clint quickly hid themselves among the rocks outside, while the three of us crept in. We followed the twists and turns of the cave until we came to a double door. I morphed quickly.

"Wow," I whispered. "I don't know if these guys are stupid or what, but they don't even have a security camera.

Steve pressed his ear comm. "All clear," he whispered. We waited until the other two caught up, then Steve kicked the door opened. A blast of warm air hit us.

"Well," Clint murmured. "At least we know it's not abandoned."

I rolled my eyes at him and looked ahead. The hallways split up and went right, left, and straight.

Steve started giving orders. "Natasha, Clint, you go left. Sarah and I will go straight, and Tony, you go right. Got it? Let's go."

We all split up. After traveling down the hall a way we heard voices and stopped, listening carefully.

"Just hurry it up," an annoyed sounding male voice said. "We don't have all day to get out of here."

"Ok, ok," a younger sounding male voice sounded. "How long do you think we have?"

"Not more than an hour. Probably less, so just hurry up, or I'll leave you here."

Footsteps toward the doorway. Steve redied his shield and hit the man as soon as he walked out. The man fell, unconscious. Steve quickly moved to the other side of the door and nodded at me. I quickly notched an arrow and we both jumped into the room. Nobody was there. I lowered my bow in confusion.

"Where'd the other one go?" I asked, an edge to my voice. "We just heard him."

"Behind you, actually," the voice rang out. I heard the click of a gun before I felt the cold steel of the barrel on my temple. At his words Steve had turned around, and now the man addressed him. "Rogers, move, and the girl dies."

Steve clenched his teeth and dropped his shield, which he had been about to throw. Then the man made a mistake. He relaxed his hold. In a moment I had disarmed him and backed him into the wall, the gun useless on the floor. We quickly subdued him, then explored the cavernous room. There was nothing there. A few desks, computers, and other stuff, which we quickly hacked into and sent the files to Fury. Suddenly a door caught my eye. It was partially hidden behind a desk, which I pushed out of the way, and then I opened the door. Nothing except a cage in which a little black wolf lay. I went over to it, froze the lock, and morphed, trotting into the cage and nosing the little wolf with my nose.

"Come on little guy," I said. "We gotta go."

He got to his paws and squinted at me.

"You look familiar," he said.

"I've been here before. Come on, let's go." I gave him a nudge to the door and he stumbled out. I gaped at what happened next. He started becoming more human like. I watched in fascination as he slowly morphed, clearly not having control over the process. When the transformation was complete, I stared in disbelief. It was Luke. I morphed in a split second and dropped to my knees beside him.

"Luke!" I exclaimed, crushing him in a hug.

"Sarah!" he exclaimed, hugging me back. "I missed you!"

"I missed you too," I pulled back and looked at him. He was thin and had on old, shabby clothing, clearly cast-offs. I felt a hand on my shoulder and looked back.

"We've gotta go, Sarah," Steve said. "The others didn't find anything, but they said more people are coming. The team is already out."

I nodded. "I'll follow you," I said as I morphed and crouched, Luke eagerly jumping onto my back and squeezing my neck. Steve rushed out, and I bounded along behind him easily. Suddenly I heard shots and bullets whizzed past me. Then suddenly we were outside and running across the frozen landscape. Dread welled up inside me. How in the world were we going to get to the jet with people shooting at us. I looked back, seeing people running behind us, then drop to one knee and continue firing. I looked ahead again, about to bark for Steve, when I saw the jet landing in front of us. We raced on, and I collapsed, panting, while Luke rolled off. When I felt like I could actually breathe again, I morphed, then plopped into the chair beside Steve as we lifted off and shot toward New York. Then I lifted Luke and plopped him into the chair beside me and smiled. I found my brother.


	9. Chapter 9

A week later, Luke had settled into the routine at the tower fairly easily. The first thing I did was teach him how to control his transformations. I had practiced so much now that I seemed I did it in a flash of light. Luke's was still kinda slow and choppy, but he was getting there. Me and Luke were on the roof one day, and I was teaching Luke how to fight in wolf form. Basically, we were play fighting. He rumbled happily and pounced, but I sidestepped and he missed. Realizing his mistake, he spun around and pounced again, this time aiming for where I was gonna be. This time he succeeded in knocking me down. I sat up and huffed happily.

"Good adjustment," I rumbled. "You catch on quick."

"Thanks," he said, looking proud of himself. Suddenly a white light hit the roof in front of us and I jumped back, my hair bristling and a growl rumbling in my throat. I stepped in front of Luke and crouched, ready to spring on whatever appeared. So I pounced toward the first thing that moved. I knocked whatever it was over, then stood with my front paws on his chest and my teeth bared in a snarl.

"Lady Sarah!" I heard someone exclaim. I focused on whomever I was threatening.

"Thor!" I yipped happily, instantly stepping off him. "I'm sorry I did that, instincts, ya know? But yeah I'm so happy to see you and I thought you'd never be ba-"

"Sarah!" Thor laughed. "I cannot understand a word you are saying."

Oh, right. Wolfness.

"I have heard the good news," he continued. "Have you indeed found your little brother?"

I nodded my head and stepped aside, revealing Luke, who had been hiding behind me.

"Luke, Thor. Thor, Luke," I introduced, forgetting the god of thunder couldn't understand me. Luke slowly stepped out. Thor immediately knelt down and patted the pups head. Luke looked to me for instructions.

"Just let him do it," I sighed. Luke immediately leaned into the hand, and grin broke out on Thor's face. Then he looked to me.

I instantly morphed before he could pet me. "Huh uh," I said, putting my hands on my hips. "You are SO not petting me."

"Of course," Thor chuckled in amusement. Then to my annoyance someone reached from behind me and ruffled my hair. I whirled around and glared accusingly at Steve, who was grinning. Suddenly a tingle shot up my spine and I tensed, finding the feeling pleasant, but a bit strange. The wolf stirred to life inside my head.

"There is someone else here," his growly voice said.

I scanned the roof. Steve, Thor, wolfie Luke, and me. "Really?" I retorted in my head. "And said person is…." I gestured around the roof.

"Use your sense," the wolf growled. "How many times do I have to tell you…."

I let out a very wolf like growl that was most certainly NOT just in my head, and pushed the wolf down. Thank you Bruce, for that little trick. Steve cast a strange, but knowing look at me, then resumed his conversation about who knows what with Thor. I sighed and cast my senses out, super hearing and smelling immediately picking up another presence on the roof. My eyes narrowed. How could another person be up here? He would have to be invisible.

"Follow your nose," the wolf said, and this time I didn't immediately push him out and took his advice. I breathed in deeply, then pinpointed the location of the invisible being. Then I threw my eyesight out, making my eyes glow an eerie green. 'There,' my mind pinpointed. A barely detectable shimmer in the air. I walked toward it. Whoever it was didn't move, most likely confident I couldn't see them. Well, too bad. Because I CAN! HA! I stopped right in front of said being and just stared at the air. Then I poked it. Hard. Like hard enough to bruise. Super-mutant wolf strength, remember? There was a barely audible sound, then the shimmering faded away, leaving a man standing in front of me, glaring.

"Hey," I stepped back and put my hands up. "It's not my fault you shimmer when your invisible."

He smirked. "And I am usually undetectable even then. Only one with a trained eye could detect it."

"More like one with glowing, supersight," I retorted, blinking as I willed my eyes to stop glowing. They did, and I inwardly smiled. Mastered powers list was going up. "So," I asked. "Who are you?"

"I am Loki, son of Laufey."

"Cool," I shrugged. "I'm Sarah Lynn, daughter of…" I stopped and clenched my teeth. I was most certainly NOT going to tear up. Loki looked at me with raised eyebrows. I quickly corrected myself. "Pretend adopted daughter of Mr. Overprotective over there," I jerked my thumb over my shoulder at Steve and grinned.

"Ah," Loki said. "I see."

Awkward silence.

"Soooo," I said. "Why are you here?"

Loki scowled. "Thor dragged me here. Literally."

I laughed. Thor had dragged me numerous places. The game room, the lab the kitchen. Then I realized Loki had been saying something and snapped back to reality.

"What?" I asked.

Loki looked at me, an annoyed expression on his face. "You weren't listening at all, were you?"

"Nope."

"Of course no," he muttered. "I was saying Thor is going to take you and the Captain to Asgard today."

"Yes!" I pumped my fist into the air. "Finally!"

The wolf stirred to life again. "What's Asgard?"

I sighed audibly. It's the place where Thor lives," I replied in my head.

"Fascinating," he deadpanned.

I was getting tired of his remarks and scowled outright. "Will you just shut up and respect me and my friends for once in your imaginary life?" I snapped at him.

"No."

"Of course not."

"The one standing beside you is the source of your tingle sensation."

"Reallyyy?" I drawled sarcastically. "Loki?"

"Yes, he has magic you can sense."

My eyebrows furrowed. So THAT'S why I felt all tingly. "Ok, you've been helpful," I said. "Now go away."

He huffed but complied, and I opened my eyes. I hadn't realized I had closed them. The first thing I saw was the bright green of Loki's eyes. I yelped and jumped back, morphing instinctively. I stopped the morph halfway and shoved the wolfness down. Loki was still staring at me, but now from farther than a few centimeters away. I scowled at him.

"Geez, Loki. You gotta let a girl know when you're going to do that," I snapped, only half joking. "I could've pounced on you or something."

Loki continued staring.

I sighed. "Pray tell, what ARE you looking at?"

"Did you just have a conversation?" he asked, cocking his head to this side. "In your head?"

"Maybe," I growled.

"Well, aren't you just a little ray of sunshine."

"I try to be."

Then Thor and Steve walked over and began discussing the trip to Asgard with me. And sometime during the conversation, Loki disappeared.

"Woah," I groaned, clutching my head as dizziness threatened to topple me off my feet. Thor laughed and steadied me from behind.

"Traveling the bifrost tends to do that to you," he grinned. Then he looked up. "Heimdall!" he exclaimed. "It is good to see you!"

"The same to you," Heimdall nodded. "And your friends as well."

I felt the now familiar tingle travel up my spine and looked back, just in time to see Loki step out of the bifrost before it powered down.

"Come," Thor boomed. "You must see the palace."

Then he gave a weird sounding whistle, and suddenly four horses stood beside us. I blinked. Did they just appear out of thin air? Thor seemed to sense my puzzlement and laughed.

"These are my horses," he explained. "They come when I call them."

Right. And apparently it wasn't weird at all to him that they just appeared out of thin air. Got it.

Thor swiftly climbed onto his horse, with the skill of someone who has done the same many, many times. He gestured toward the other horses. "You may take your pick, Lady Sarah."

I smiled and immediately chose an all black one, a Friesian, , then planted my foot in the stirrup and expertly swung myself up. Thor looked at me, a surprised expression on his face.

"I did not know you could ride," he said.

"It's been a while," I shrugged. "But my family used to own horses." As soon as I said the word "family", I had to will myself not to tear up. Steve glanced over at me sympathetically. Soon we were all mounted. Even Steve had ridden before, to my surprise. We started out walking, but it soon turned to a steady trot, which I rode easily.

"These will be your mounts for the rest of the week," Thor said to me and Steve. The three of us were riding side by side.

I smoothed my horse's mane. What's her name?" I asked.

Thor smiled. "I named her after a flower in mid-gard. It is Lilac. She is Loki's favorite horse."

I looked back at the silent god, who was posting to the trot without even thinking, his eyes unfocused. Soon we were riding into the village, and even sooner we had reached the palace. I was shown my room for the week, then met Sif and the warriors three, when Thor asked if I wanted to go riding again.

"I sensed you enjoyed it," his blue eyes twinkled. "And I also sensed you wanted to go faster."

I smiled gently and looked down. "Just…so many memories of my family, I guess. We all used to go riding together."

"Ah, I see," Thor said. "Then the four of us shall go, and we shall ride long and fast."

My eyes twinkled. "I challenge the mighty Thor to a race."

"Challenge excepted," he grinned. "I eagerly await to see your true riding skills."

Steve and Loki appeared beside us.

"What's this about a race?" Steve asked.

"Imma race the mighty Thor!" I yelled, earning some strange looks from the palace staff and a smirk for Loki.

"May I also enter this race?" he asked.

"Sure," I smiled at him. "The more the merrier, right?"

Steve jumped in. "I'll probably lose, but can I join?" he asked.

"Uh huh," I said. "But before we go, can I change first?" I gestured down toward my sweat pants. "I brought jeans and boots, like you told me too."

"Of course," Thor smiled. "I will meet you down in the stables."

We all separated, and to my surprise, I found Steve walking silently beside me. I mean, his room is right next to mine and everything, but he already had jeans and stuff on. He finally broke the silence.

"You still miss them don't you?" he asked quietly.

I bit my lip and swallowed back the sudden lump in my throat. "Everyday," I whispered.

He was silent a moment more. "I'm always here for you, Sarah. Don't forget that. You don't need to suffer in silence."

I looked down. "I-" I stopped, then looked up into Steve's caring blue eyes and smiled gently. "Thanks Steve. That means a lot to me."

He smiled back, and we parted ways.

"Ok," I said a few minutes later. "Where are we going to race?" We were all down in the stables, tacking up. I was brushing Lilac. Steve was in the stall beside me and Loki on my other side, so I couldn't see the thunder god and he didn't answer. I sighed and resumed brushing Lilac's legs. There, I was done.

"Sometime before this week is over, I'm gonna give you a bath," I cooed to her, running my hands through her mane. Suddenly I remembered something.

"Does anyone have a hoof pick?" I asked, not looking up. There was a quick "Nope" from Steve. Suddenly I sensed something flying toward my head and whirled around, holding my hand up before my face and catching what was thrown. It was a hoofpick. I scowled at Loki, who had thrown it, and he smirked.

"Good reflexes," he raised an eyebrow.

"Thanks," I muttered. "I think."

Soon we were all ready and tacked up, and I finally managed to get Thor's attention, when we were out in the open fields.

"Thor," I urged Lilac into a trot and caught up with him. "Hey, where are we racing?"

He glanced at me and opened his mouth to answer, but suddenly Loki thundered past yelling, "Here!"

"Hey!" I exclaimed, urging Lilac into a gallop, grinning at the air rushing past me. I looked back to see Steve content to canter slowly, then heard hoofbeats beside me as Thor brushed past.

"Oh, you're on," I muttered, spurring Lilac on even faster. "I'm gonna beat you SOOOO bad."

Then I poured my own energy into Lilac, a trick I had learned a little while ago. She immediately made use of the energy, and soon we swept past Thor and were gaining on Loki. I slowed Lilac down a bit and rode beside him for a moment. He glanced over, surprised.

"Later, loser!" laughing as I streaked ahead of him. He pulled up beside me moments later.

"I can do that too, you know," he smirked over at me.

"Is that a challenge I hear?" I grinned. He smiled back, the first genuine smile I had seen from him.

"You cannot beat me, wolf girl," his eyes twinkled mischievously.

"Oh yeah? I accept your challenge."

"To the grove of trees," he pointed to the faint splotch in the distance, then jerked his thumb back over his shoulder. "I think the others are disqualified."

I looked back and laughed. The others had stopped and were chatting.

"Then…GO!" I instantly poured more of my energy into Lilac on and grinned. Oh, he had NO IDEA how much endurance I had. He was going down. I kept up the steady flow of energy and Lilac snorted, feeling the extra power inside her, then sped up. I glanced over. Loki was matching me stride for stride, a determined look on his face. I clenched my teeth and let even more energy flow, then gradually started gaining. He looked at me with a surprised expression. 'That's right, buddy,' I thought. 'Don't underestimate this midgardian.' I looked ahead again. The grove of trees was close. Suddenly Loki shot past me, a triumphant smirk on his face. Oh no, I am not going down that easy. I spurred Lilac on, and soon we were both sweeping past the grove of trees. I pulled on the reigns gently, slowing Lilac to a walk/ Loki came up to me.

"I will admit you are a formidable foe," he said, smiling. "It was a good race, and resulted in a tie."

My heart jolted at his words. My dad used to say almost the same thing after we had raced. I squeezed my eyes shut and buried my head in my hands as memories I had struggled for so long to bury resurfaced. I was trying my hardest not to cry but failed, feeling a few tears leak out. Suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder.

"I-I'm sorry, have I offended you?" Loki's quiet, hesitant voice sounded beside me. I looked over at him and tried to smile. "No, no," I said, raking a hand across my face. "You just….remind me of someone, that's all."

"Oh," he looked down for a moment, then back up at me. "Shall we go meet our companions?"


	10. Chapter 10

It was Thursday. We were going home tomorrow, and I was genuinely sad to go. Well, I guess it was already Friday, it was just two in the morning. I couldn't sleep after the nightmare woke me up, so I dressed in jeans and a t-shirt and stuck my earbuds in. Only to yank them out again as someone burst into my room. Thor and Loki rushed in, then slammed the door closed and leaned on it as someone pounded on it from the other side. I jumped up.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"The palace is under siege by the Chitari," Thor said, fear in his eyes. "They are slaughtering everyone they can find."

My eyes widened and only one thought ran through my mind. "Steve," I breathed, instantly darting toward the door connecting our rooms. Only I didn't get there. The door burst open, making me stumble back, unparalleled fear instantly filling my heart. What had happened to Steve? I backed up to join Thor and Loki, grabbing my dagger off the table. Like that's gonna be any help. A dagger against, what, 30 Chitari warriors? There was only one thought running through my head. We are all. Going. To. Die.

"Let me out," the wolf suddenly snarled.

"Wait," I replied. "I'll use my ice powers for as long as I can first, then I'll let you out."

"Fine." Then he was silent.

I clenched my teeth as the Chitari surrounded us. "What have you done with Steve?" I demanded, letting out a very inhuman growl.

"Your friend," one of them hissed. "Is dead."

My heart skipped a beat. No, no, no ,no ,no, this couldn't be happening. But I didn't have any time to dwell on it, because the Chitari suddenly attacked. I froze one that was coming straight at me, then another one that was going for Loki. He spared me a brief nod before having to focus on the rush of aliens once more. Thor was doing the most damage with his hammer, but they somehow managed to get him unconscious, and that's when I knew we were done for. I was back to back with Loki, fending off the Chitari the best we could, but it was obvious they were going to get us. And get us they did. Suddenly three were upon me, and I barely had anytime to scream before everything went black.

'I've got to stop waking up like this,' I internally groaned. I cracked my eyes opened, only to see Loki's bright green ones centimeters from my own.

"Loki," I groaned. "Get out of my face, you're in my personal space bubble."

He instantly retreated, looking me up and down. "Dizzy?"

"That's an understatement."

"Headache?"

"Even bigger understatement." I looked around. "Where are we?"

He sighed. "I do not know, but I am fairly certain we are not on one of the realms."

I leaned my head back against the rough stone wall behind me. "Are we in a cave?"

"I believe so, yes."

"Fantastic," I pushed myself to my feet, still dizzy.

Loki had a confused expression on his face. "I fail to see how this is fantastic in any way."

I stifled a smirk. "Its sarcasm. So where's Thor?"

"No idea."

"Steve?"

"Still no idea."

"So why am I stuck with you?"

"Thanks," he smiled wryly.

"Sorry, but seriously."

"You are asking the wrong person."

I looked around once again. "Any way out?"

"Not as far as I can tell."

"Well then how did we get in here?"

"I believe those who have brought us here have the ability to pass through rock."

"Are you serious?"

"Quite."

I sighed. "So what do they want with us?"

Loki looked down. "I believe they want to harness our abilities for their use."

I instantly paled. Oh no, this is bad, this is very, very bad. "We've gotta get out of here."

"Thank you for that obvious statement," he said. Silence. "So how do you propose we do that?"

"Oh, I don't know." Suddenly I got an idea. My eyes lit up, and I cast my senses out. Steve and Thor were beside us, probably in a similar place. I breathed a sigh of relief as I found both their life forces. They were both fine. But as far as I could tell, there was indeed no way out. Then I looked closely at Loki. "You're hurt," I stated, then noticed for the first time my spine wasn't tingling. "And your magic has been suppressed."

He looked surprised. "Yes my rocks somehow suppress my magic, but I am not wounded."

I stared at him, unamused. He was hurt, and though he did a good job of hiding it, I could tell. I inwardly winced, wondering what had happened. I went over to him and gently touched his arm. Sure enough, he winced and pulled away. I put my hands on my hips and glared at him.

"Loki Laufeyson, if you do not let me treat that, I will…." I threw my hands up, at loss for a threat. "Smack you or something, just get over here."

He smirked but complied, and I pulled the sleeve of his shirt up, then winced sympathetically. I was a jagged scratch, deep and long, running down the length of his arm. I gently touched it, then closed my eyes and transferred my healing energy to him. Soon the wound was healed.

"Thanks," he said, then opened his mouth as if to say more, but suddenly I felt a cold hand clamp onto my arm and yelped as I was forcefully jerked from the room. I blinked when I stopped moving, then looked around and discovered I was in a long hallway, eerily glowing from the light of the torches. Great. Then I was roughly grabbed on both sides by two Chitari, who wrenched my hands behind my back and began escorting me down the hallway. They immediately made their plans for me known.

"Do you know what we're going to do now, earthling?" One hissed.

"Yes, it will be most unpleasant for you," the other said.

Fear instantly filled my heart. No, this cannot be happening again. Why is this happening again? Oh yeah, because I have the worst luck in the world. They continued pulling me down the hallway. We finally reached a door, and they pulled me in. But they didn't have time to do anything else, for suddenly a wave of magic threw all the Chitari into the wall. Loki appeared beside me, Steve and Thor in tow. He grabbed my arm, and suddenly we were transported back to Asgard, standing in the palace.

"Hey!" someone yelled from behind us. Thor let out a high pitched scream that would have made a little girl proud and whirled around. I did the same, minus the scream, then breathed a sigh of relief when I saw it was only Sif. "Where have you been?" she asked.

I let a relieved smile cross my face. It was all over.


	11. Chapter 11

"Loki!" I yelled, sliding around the corner. "Give it back!"

He looked back at me, a grin quirking his lips in amusement and holding my phone up. It had been two weeks since we got back to the tower, and everything was back to normal. My eyes narrowed at Loki and a very wolf-like growl escaped my throat as I morphed, quickly catching up to him, grabbing my phone, then morphed once again and raced in the opposite direction. I slid around the corner once again, narrowly avoiding Steve, whose lips quirked into a grin when he saw me. I stopped and smiled back.

"Hey Steve," I greeted.

"Hey," he said. "I was just going down to the training room, care to join me?"

"Sure," I started walking beside him.

"So why were you running?" he asked after a few minutes.

"Loki stole my phone."

"Ah, I see."

"For the second time today," I laughed as we reached the training room.

He looked at me. "Feel up to a fighting match?" he asked.

"You bet," I answered. We moved into the ring and took our places, but we didn't have time to do anything else, because suddenly the doors burst open and people rushed in, quickly surrounding us.

"Steve," I said, my heart racing. "What's happening?"

"Hydra," he breathed, blue eyes darting around frantically. My eyes widened. The people stopped moving and a man stepped forward.

"It would do you well to surrender, Captain Rogers and Sarah Lynn. If not, we will be forced to shoot both of you."

I clenched my teeth and did a quick calculation. Ok, us against 20 men with guns. What about the rest of the team? Steve seemed to read my thoughts and stepped forward.

"What have you done to my team?" he demanded.

"Subdued and captured," the man said coolly. "Now surrender, or we will shoot."

Steve narrowed his eyes, then suddenly grabbed his shield and backed us both into the corner, the bullets banging harmlessly off the metal shield in front of us.

"Jarvis!" Steve yelled over the hail of gunfire. "Get the others, now!"

"I am sorry, sir," Jarvis said. "The rest of the avengers have been removed from the building." My heart skipped a beat. So Hydra was telling the truth.

"That's it," I growled suddenly, then morphed and jumped over the shield, pouncing on the first gunman. The next coming at me was quickly knocked aside by Steve's shield, as he jumped into the fight as well.

"Let me take control," the wolf suddenly growled. "I can fight in this form much better than you can."

"Nuh uh," I retorted in my head as I pounced on another Hydra agent. Suddenly I yelped as a bullet scraped my side. "Fine," I said. "Just don't kill me, please."

The next thing I knew I was standing over the last Hydra agent with my teeth bared. I blinked and backed up, then morphed quickly, wincing slightly as pain flared to life in my side. Then Steve was beside me.

"We've gotta go, NOW," he said, breathing slightly heavily. "There's probably more coming."

"Got it," I said as we raced toward the garage. "But where are we going to go?"

"Shield," he replied as we jumped into one of Tony's cars and raced into the streets of New York. "That's probably the only safe place."

My leg bounced, a nervous little habit I had. "They're going to know exactly where we're headed."

"I know, and they're going to try to cut us off before we get there."

"Well, then let's just get there first."

"Easy for you to say, you're not the one driving."

"Just don't crash and kill us both."

"I'll do my best."

"That's not reassuring."

-endofchapter-

Ok, sorry guys. Short Chapter. The next one will be longer! I would like to thank reviewer Guest: ME, for all her reviews and encouragement! And yes, I know the scenes kind of jump around a bit, but the line break is not working...and I didn't realize it until recently. Guess I can't just hit enter anymore! Anyway, THANKS!


	12. Chapter 12

A special thanks to guest:ME for all the reviews. I am sorry if it seems a bit rushed, it most likely does. I just have an idea in my head for the sequal already, and I _really _want to get to writing that. :)

_L_

"That's not reassuring," I retorted.

Suddenly gunshots rang out from behind us and I ducked, burying my head in my hands. I turned my head slightly to look in the side mirror.

"Steve," I said, a note of warning in my voice. "Three black cars behind us."

"Hang on," his hands tightened on the steering wheel. "We're gonna run a red light."

I braced myself as we raced through the intersection, narrowly avoiding several vehicles, then looked behind us and breathed a sigh of relief when I saw the cars no longer in sight. Suddenly Steve gave a yell and jerked the wheel to the side, swerving around the cars that had tried to black our path. More gunshots. The back window shattered, showering us both with the sharp shrapnel.

"Jarvis!" I yelled, a note of panic tinging my voice. "How far to shield headquarters?"

"Approx. fifteen minutes," said the AI system programmed into the car.

I clenched my teeth. That wasn't good. "Find us a shortcu-" my words cut off and my eyes widened as a semi pulled out if front of us. Steve swore and jerked the wheel hard to the right. We turned skidding across the pavement. Then another car slammed into our side. I was jerked to the side and for a moment everything went black. I shook my head to clear it, the realized I was hanging upside down from my seatbelt. I quickly unlatched my seatbelt, putting one hand on the roof and somersaulting onto my feet. Natasha would be proud, that actually looked pretty cool. I laid on my stomach and wiggled through the broken window, wincing as some of the glass shards cut into my skin. I stood up, then looked around frantically. Steve was nowhere to be seen. Then a yell split the air, and my head whipped around to see men coming at me with guns raised. I darted around to the other side of the car as gunshots rang out, then slipped through the narrow gap between car and semi and raced away in the opposite direction, my eyes darting around for Steve's familiar frame. My seeking eyes found nothing, and I clenched my teeth and continued running, darting through the streets toward Shield headquarters. I inwardly cursed Fury for building it so far from Avengers Tower. I slid around a corner, nearly colliding with a few pedestrians. A yelp suddenly burst from my lips as a shot tore through my leg, making me tumble to the ground. Suddenly two men were towering above me, I heard a buzzing noise, and everything went black.

I came to slowly, very nearly tried to move and stretch, then remembered my predicament and kept still. I assessed the situation the best I could. I was sitting up, my hands pulled tightly behind my back and bound with metal handcuffs. My feet seemed to be free, no other restraints I could feel restricting my movement. I felt motion, probably a vehicle. I tested the handcuffs. Easily breakable, and I inwardly cheered the stupidity of Hydra. I might look week, but I'm actually almost as strong as Steve. I saw movement in my peripheral and turned my head slightly to see better. Two guards, armed, staring straight ahead. 'Ok,' I thought. 'It's now or never.' I broke the handcuffs effortlessly, then disarmed both guard with a kick, knocked them both out, morphed and burst out the door. I probably should have looked before jumping out. Luckily it wasn't a cliff or anything. I landed hard, rolling and tumbling, but was quickly up to my paws, streaking across the fields and was into the dense woods before Hydra even knew I was gone. I collapsed onto the pine needles, morphed, then checked my wrist and breathed a sigh of relief. The watch that Tony had made me was still there. I pressed a small button.

"Jarvis?" I asked. "You there?"

"At your service, Ms. Lynn," his electronic voice sounded.

"Pinpoint my location."

"My scans show you are in Mason County, Illinois, near the outskirts of Amity Park."

I blinked. Why would they bring me to my old hometown? And if I'm near the outskirts then that would mean…..I looked around. Sure enough, the scenery was familiar.

"Thanks Jarv," I said. "Do me a favor and block the GPS and tracer signals in the watch."

"Very well, would you like me to power down as well, to ensure you cannot be traced?"

I hesitated. Jarvis could be useful, but having him active meant that someone could trace his signals. "Sure Jarv."

There was a faint whirring noise, then all was silent. I looked around once again. 'Ok,' I thought. 'I can't go waltzing into town, but I need a place to crash contact shield. If only I had my phone…' I felt my pockets. Nope, no phone. 'And Steve,' I made a mental note. 'Shield, then Steve.' An idea suddenly popped into my head.

"Cameron," I murmured. Cameron was my best friend before the accident, and as far as I knew, he thought me and Luke dead, just as everyone else did. His house was close to here, and Hydra wouldn't think to look there. I made up my mind. I would at least try. I morphed quickly, then bounded through the woods, avoiding clearings and staying to the trees until I came to the little clearing his house was in. I morphed, then hesitated, then made up my mind once again. I REALLY needed to contact Shield. I finally went up and knocked on the door. The curtains moved off to the side and a face peered out. Cameron's mom. The face disappeared from the window and I quickly pulled the hood of my sweatshirt up, partly hiding my face. The door opened.

"Yes?" Amy Lockland asked, looking at me. I kept my head down.

"Is Cameron available?" I asked, changing my voice.

"Yeah," she said. "Hold on a sec." She disappeared from the doorway and I could hear her calling for him. Footsteps back to the doorway. She appeared once more. "He'll be a minute," she said. "Would you like to come in?"

"Umm….sure," I said, following her into the house as she led me to the kitchen.

"So are you a friend from school?" she asked.

"Yeah," I said, the lie slipping smoothly from my mouth. "We're doing a science project together."

"Ah," she said. "So would you like something to drink?"

"No thanks," I replied. The phone rang, and she moved to the other room to get it. I heard footsteps coming down the stairs, and soon Cam appeared in the doorway, looking at me with a confused expression on his face.

"May I help you?" he asked, clearly not recognizing me. Well how could he? I had my head down and hood up, keeping my face hidden.

"Yeah," I said, keeping my change of voice. Natasha had taught me well. "Can we talk in private?"

"Um…" he blinked. "Well, the only other person here right now besides me is my mom so…."

"Can we please talk in private?" I repeated, looking pointedly at him from under my hood. He looked baffled, but consented.

"Sure," he said after a short pause, leading me into his father's study and shutting the door. Then he turned to me.

"Ok, umm, what?" he asked.

"Don't you know me?" I said, letting my voice go back to normal. "We're doing a science project together, remember?"

I inwardly smirked at his completely confused, helpless face. The truth was, right before the accident we WERE doing a science project together. Then I supposedly "died." A sudden pang of guilt hit me. I could only imaging what Cameron went through after the accident. He had just lost his best friend, how horribly traumatizing must that have been. He blinked once again, thoroughly confused.

"What?" he asked. I looked up and met his eyes, pulling my hood back at the same time. His eyes widened and he gave a disbelieving gasp. I jumped forward and slapped a hand over his mouth before he could yell my name, then slowly removed it. He got the picture.

"Sarah!" he exclaimed quietly, stepping forward and hugging me. "I thought you were dead."

He pulled back and I smiled sadly at him. "Let's just say I was lucky I was home late that day."

He looked ecstatic, confused, sad, and angry all at once. "But you…after the explosion you disappeared, everyone thought you were dead. Where'd you go, and where have you been all this time?" His eyes narrowed. "And why didn't you contact me and why have you just shown up now?"

I sighed. "Long story."

He just looked at me expectantly.

I sighed again. "Ok, after the explosion, I was kidnapped by the same people who killed my parents, but then I escaped and went on the run, fearing the same would happen to anyone else I got close to. An organization, which you don't need to know about, found me, and I joined a special group of people with that organization. I didn't contact you because it would have put you in danger."

He stared at me. "Then why are you here now?"

I winced. "The same people who kidnapped me before got to my team, which you also do not need to know about. Me and another person got away, but I don't know where he is, and I need to try to contact said organization 'cause their likely my only protection against these guys."

"So you need a phone?" It was of a statement than a question.

"Preferably an untraceable one."

"I have one."

"Really?"

"Yeah," he pulled out his cell. "It bounces the signal three different times a second, so it should be pretty secure."

He handed me his phone. My mind started turning and part of a plan started forming. I felt for my comm. Not there.

"Ok, do you have a Bluetooth earpiece?" I asked. "Or something that I can do something wirelessly with?"

"Yeah," Cam said, walking to his father's desk and pulling out a drawer. "Dad's company has been working on these little devices that-" As soon as he held it up I had grabbed it and was examining it.

"Not as good as shield's tech, but meh, it'll work. You have a computer I can use?"

He led me over to his dad's laptop and hit the power button. A password screen popped up.

"Sorry," he winced. "No one knows the password but Dad."

I didn't say anything, but unlatched my watch and took off a little compartment on the band, then unrolled a little wire and plugged it into the computer. A pop-up window popped up, racing through firewalls and hacking into the system. If I had my phone the process would have been completed in seconds, but this was going to take at least five minutes. I pulled out Cam's phone and dialed shield.

An operative answered. "Shield," was all she said.

"Director Fury," I said.

"Password?"

I let loose a string of meaningless numbers Fury had put together so that only select people could reach him. Fury's phone rang.

"You know the password to get to me, yet this is an unfamiliar number. I identify yourself," he demanded as soon as he picked up the phone.

"It's Lynn, sir," I said. "I am borrowing a phone for this call."

"Lynn!" he yelled. "Where in the world are you?! I've been trying to get a hold of the team for a while now, but nothing's working. What's happening?"

I leaned over the computer to see how the progress was going. Almost there. I came back to Fury's question. "Hydra has the avengers, sir. The Captain and I were the only two that escaped, and even now I don't know his whereabouts."

"Where are you now?"

"They brought me to my hometown for reasons unknown. Even now I am probably not safe. I am with a trusted friend now, and no, I am not telling him information he does not need to be responsible for."

"Good, do you have a plan?"

"Yes sir, try to contact Captain Rogers, then get back to headquarters. Where are you now, sir?"

"I'm on the helicarrier, not in New York."

"I'm going to need transportation to the helicarrier.."

"Location?" he asked. At that instant I finished hacking into the computer and leaned over the keys, connecting the earpiece to the laptop.

"Amity Park, Illinois," I said. "I've found a comm link, and I'll let you know the frequency when I'm done programming it."

Silence, then, "Quin-jet is on its way. Any idea where he could land?"

I racked my brain. "Yeah, there's a hill above town, I'll meet it there," I said, tapping the computer keys and uploading Jarvis onto the comm link. Then I pulled up the frequency numbers and relayed it to Fury.

"Got it," he said. "Coulson will be here on the other end if you need him."

"Thank you, sir," I said. "I'll check in when I'm on the helicarrier."

"See that you do," he said, then hung up. I pulled the phone from my ear and set it down, then stuck the comm link in.

"Jarvis?" I asked. "You there?"

"Online and ready, Ms. Lynn," he said.

"Ok, Jarv," I said, smirking as Cam looked at me like I was crazy. It did look like I was talking to nothing, by the way. Suddenly the communication's link crackled to life.

"Lynn?" Coulson's voice sounded.

"Coulson!" I exclaimed, smiling. "Long time no see. Nice to know that I programmed this thing right in the thirty seconds that I did."

"You're getting as good as Stark," he mumbled.

"Hey," I said, next hooking the phone up to the computer. "I live in the same place with the guy, I've gotta pick something up. Plus, he's my schoolteacher, and computer programming is a major subject in his book."

"Well, I'm here if you need me," Coulson said.

"Awww," I said, grinning to myself. "You don't wanna chat with me?"

I finished uploading Jarvis to the phone as well and unhooked it.

"Frankly," Coulson said. "No."

"Good," I said. "Cause I'm gonna try to reach Spangles next, so shush it for a few."

"A few what?" Coulson grumbled as I turned the phone on.

"Jarvis?" I asked.

"Yes, Ms. Lynn?" he asked. Cam visibly jumped.

"You operational?"

"Fully."

"Good, dial Capsicle for me."

The phone rang and rang, but no one picked up. Worry coursed through me and I clenched my teeth as his voicemail picked up.

"Steve," I said, hoping he just wasn't answering because it was an unfamiliar number. "It's Sarah, are you there? I got away and-"

"Sarah!" a hurried voice suddenly picked up. "Where are you?"

You're okay!" I exclaimed, my muscles relaxing as tension I didn't know I had drained out of me. "I'm in-" I stopped, suddenly sensing something was wrong. Steve didn't sound right. I narrowed my eyes and sat up straighter. No "Are you okay's" and "You worried me sick's"? Something was up.

"Steve, is something wrong?"

"No," he said quickly, not sounding like himself at all. "Now where are you?" his voice had a harsh and panicked edge to it.

Suddenly I realized what was happening. "Hydra," I growled. "If you do anything to him, so help me-"

Click. They hung up. I clenched my teeth and stood up. They had forced him to take the call, told him what to say, threatened him if he said something wrong. My fists clenched so tight I'm surprised the phone didn't shatter. I whirled around and lowered my head so Cameron couldn't see the angry green glow of my eyes. I REALLY wanted to punch something right now. And if I stayed inside any longer, I was going to. I stepped out the sliding glass doors and breathed in the cool night air, calming myself down slowly. I turned slightly as the door shut, evidencing Cameron had followed me.

"I'm gonna need your phone," I said, voice tight and strained. "I'll send you money to make up for it."

"Ok," he said quietly. Silence. "What are you going to do now?"

I sighed, trying vainly to relax my tense muscles. "Get to shield first, then-" I stopped, hanging my head. "Then….. I don't know."

A stick snapped in the darkness ahead of us. My head shot up, my advanced eyesight cast out instinctively, not caring whether Cameron saw the bright green glow of my eyes this time. I saw six dark shadows advancing forward. Hydra had caught up to me. I quickly spoke to Cam without looking at him.

"Cam, go into the house, now. They're after me, and won't bother you if I'm not here." He didn't move at first. "Go!" Then he moved, rushing inside and closing the door, though I knew he'd be peeking out somewhere. I narrowed my eyes at the advancing guards.

"Jarvis, how many are there?" I asked.

"Sixteen surrounding the house, Ms. Lynn. The jet has landed on the described spot, and is waiting for you," his voice sounded in my ear.

"Got it," I muttered. "That helps at least." I spoke to Jarvis again. "Is there a gap in their forces anywhere?"

"Behind you on the other side of the house an agent is missing, providing the perfect escape route."

"Thanks Jarv." I narrowed my eyes at the advancing agents. "Ok, Hydra," I muttered. "You're in for the ride of your life." My eyes darted around, planning my escape. I grinned as I figured it out and made my eyes glow brightly. 'Ok,' I thought. 'Here I am, Hydra. A bright, glowing green target. But soon I'm going to disappear and you're going to be so confused it's going to be hilarious.' They got within twenty feet of me, and suddenly I morphed, blending in to the deepening gloom. I jumped up onto the stone wall surrounding the porch, then leaped as high as I could onto the roof. I got a good pawhold, then ran up the gently incline and down the other side, jumping onto the wall on the other side, then racing through the breech in their defenses. I raced into the night and toward the meeting spot. AKA, the hill. I was actually racing up the hill when they finally caught up to me.

"Took ya long enough," I muttered. "Stupid Hydra agents…" Shots rang out, and I yelped as one scratched my leg. Well, my leg when I was a wolf, my arm when I'm human. Ugh, this gets confusing. I reached the top of the hill and burst into the clearing. I immediately caught sight of the jet and raced toward it. The side door slid opened, and I dived on just as a bullet ripped through my shoulder. I tumbled in, panting and collapsing in a heap of fur on the floor. The door closed, and we lifted off, headed toward the helicarrier. I morphed quickly and plopped myself down beside Agent Maria Hill, who was piloting.

"I brought medics," she raised her eyebrows at me.

I groaned and leaned my head back. "You know me WAY too well."


	13. Chapter 13

"Fury," I clenched my teeth, struggling to keep my anger in check. "We are NOT just going to sit here while Hydra has my brother, and the Avengers, are we?"

Fury raised his chin and glared at me. "What do you expect me to do, Lynn? We're already doing everything possible. There's nothing else we CAN do."

I stood up abruptly from my chair and began pacing once again, clenching my fists. "So we ARE just going to sit here." It was more of a statement than a question.

Fury sighed. "Please, Lynn. Understand me when I say we are doing EVERYTHING we can. Now, you will go get examined properly by the physicians, get your injuries more thoroughly, get cleaned up, and get some rest. You will be of no use to anyone if you are asleep on your feet."

I sighed, collapsing back into my chair and burying my head in my hands.

"Lynn."

I looked up.

"That's an order."

I sighed again and stood up, then headed to the med bay, realizing for the first time just how dead tired I was. I sat through my treatment, which was just mainly cleaning and dressing my wounds. I didn't see the point in it. I was already almost healed anyway. But I persevered through it, and soon I was headed, bleary eyes, toward my room. As I fell into bed, my last thought was, 'I hope Luke's okay.'

-linebreak-

I woke up a few hours later due to someone knocking/pounding on my door. I groaned and pulled myself out of bed, fully ready to kill whomever was rude and unfortunate enough to intrude in my blissful world of sleep. It was Fury.

"Lynn," he said as soon as he opened the door. "We found something."

My eyes widened and I immediately followed him down the corridor, pulling my messy black hair into a ponytail as I went. He led me to the controls room, then pulled up a map.

"Someone activated their transponder here," he pointed to a dot on the map. "We think it was Captain Roger's signal. It suddenly disappeared here," he pointed to another dot. "And we think they discovered the transponder and destroyed it. I've chosen to send you in to retrieve what's left of it and scout around, though there's probably nothing there now."

I sighed. Anything to get my mind off this, and anything to stop this endless waiting.

"Sure," I said flatly. "When?"

"Now," he said, looking at me.

I nodded and headed out to the immediately headed out to the deck, where I discovered a quin-jet waiting. I promptly passed out once again, and awoke with a jolt when we landed. The automated doors slid opened, and I stepped out and instinctively surveyed my surroundings. I was in the middle of nowhere. My eyebrows furrowed. This wasn't the right place. Suddenly the quin-jet powered up and the rotors started spinning. I yelped and dove out of the way of the spinning blades, rolling in the soft sand. The quin-jet rose up, then disappeared into the horizon. I blinked, then narrowed my eyes.

"Fury," I growled, feeling for my phone. Not there. None of my tech was there, neither were any of my weapons. I looked around once again. Nothing. Literal middle of nowhere. Nothing but hot desert sand. And…..people? I blinked, then rubbed my eyes. Yeah, there were definitely people coming toward me. My internal alarm went off and I backed up, fully ready to retreat the other way. Only to bump into someone behind me. I whirled around and jumped back, instinctively crouching into a defensive position.

"Please," the man said, raising his eyebrows. "None of that. You are completely surrounded, and I would very much like not to kill you after all the trouble I went through getting you here."

I straightened. "G-getting me here? What?"

The man casually picked at his fingernails. "Ah, yes. Nice to know that SHIELD complied with our demands."

"Complied?" I asked, my voice trailing off in confusion.

"Yes, Fury was not that easy to persuaded, but we have our ways."

"Fury? He did this?" My expression was one of hurt.

"Actually," the man said. "We did this. Fury just didn't want his secrets getting out, so he agreed to give you up if we didn't squeal. Now, are you going to cooperate? Or will we need to shoot you?"

Something crumbled inside me. Knowing Fury would purposely send me here to get captured, practically giving me to Hydra. I looked around at the hundred or so men with their guns trained on me, and I gave up.

"On your knees with your hands behind your head," the man said coolly, still not looking at me. I complied. "Smart choice," the man said, looking up at m and smiling crookedly as his men subdued me, wrenching my hands down behind my back and securing them with thick metal bands, clearly made for someone even stronger than me. Then they pulled me up, shoved me into a dark car and drove off to who knows where. I felt defeated. My team was captured, then I was captured, then I escaped, thinking I was safe at Shield, then I get a mission, only to discover it was all a set up by Fury to get me captured. And all because Fury had some skeletons in his closet that he would rather keep hidden. I hung my head, feeling absolutely drained and betrayed by one of the people I trusted most. The drive went on and on, and I vaguely wondered where they were taking me, but somehow I couldn't bring myself to care. Suddenly the car jerked to a stop, and sunlight flooded the car as the door opened. I submitted as they yanked me out of the car and marched me into the building, keeping my head down. They marched me down some drab hallways, then we stopped, and a door clanged opened. A key was fit into my cuffs as they were removed, and I was pushed through the door. I heard a gasp and looked up, just in time to see Steve before he crushed me in a hug.

"Sarah!" he exclaimed, squeezing me. I returned the gesture, burying my head in his chest and wishing all my troubles would just go away. He pulled back and looked me over, a concerned expression on his face. "Are you okay? Did they hurt you?"

I shook my head, and he immediately noticed my odd behavior.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

I sighed. "It's Fury," I said quietly. "He betrayed us."

Steve's eyebrows furrowed. "What?"

"Hydra apparently contacted him and threatened him with something unless he gave them me. So here I am." I looked down and stuffed my hands into my pockets. Steve sat down heavily and buried his head in his hands.

"This doesn't make sense," he muttered.

I gave a bitter laugh. "Actually, it makes perfect sense if you think about it. I would be useless without you guys, and he knows it. So Hydra contacts him, threatens him, tells him where to put me and voila, here I am."

"No," Steve muttered. "You're his best agent, he wouldn't just give you up. This doesn't add up…" he trailed off.

Suddenly I felt something in my pocket and pulled it out. It was a transponder.

"No," I said, looking up at Steve with a sudden happy grin. "It makes perfect sense."

I held up the mini transponder between my thumb and forefinger. He looked at it and smiled. Suddenly there was a shout and an explosion above us.

"Army's here," I quipped.

Suddenly the door burst opened and Coulson stepped in.

"You guys okay?" he asked.

"Peachy," Steve replied.

I just smirked. "Took ya long enough."

-linebreak-

The Hydra base went down without a fight, and the rest of the team and Luke were relatively unharmed. The incident made me realize one thing. Luke wasn't safe with me. So Tony helped me locate my Aunt and Luke is now living comfortably with her. Things returned to the hectic norm that made up my life, and I happily settled into it. Fury apologized for tricking me, to which I forgave him. I visited Luke sometimes, but I ultimately decided to stay at the tower. Because once you have a family, there's no turning back. Especially when Tony will just drag you back anyway. And besides, someone's gotta make sure Thor has his poptarts, and Steve still hasn't found his shield yet. I mighta kinda sorta hid it, then forgot about it, then forgot where I hid it.

"Sarah, where's my shield?"

Oops.

Ok, THE END! I already have a sequal planned, so anyway…REVIEWS ARE GREATLY APPRECIATED!


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